There’s nowhere to go but up for the Edmonton Oilers.
The Oilers were thumped 6-4 by Chicago in the opener of their best-of-five qualifying round series on Saturday. They practiced on Sunday afternoon with an eye on a much better effort in game two.
“It wasn’t how we wanted to start the series. Having said that, there are lots of ups-and-downs during a playoff series,” said winger James Neal, who has 105 career playoff games under his belt.
“We kind of just dipped our toe in the water and weren’t full committed to how we need to play.”
“It’s amazing the work ethic and battle wouldn’t be there for game one, but for whatever reason, we were sluggish,” said head coach Dave Tippett. “We worked on some things in practice today. We talked about some things, but unless you’re willing to do them in a game, they don’t matter much.”
The top defence pairing of Oscar Klefbom and Adam Larsson weren’t anywhere near expectations in game one. They were on the ice for three of the Blackhawks four first period goals.
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“Both of them need to be better. We rely on them for big minutes. Both of them were poor last night. We need to have them better,” Tippett said.
“We have to play them a lot harder, have them a little bit more under control,” Larsson said. “Play them a lot harder and a lot smarter.”
Once again, Tippett won’t tip his hand about the starting goalie for game two. “That wasn’t a goaltender problem yesterday. That was a players-in-front-of-them problem,” he said.
Tippett added that everyone practiced on Sunday, including Tyler Ennis, who took a check to the head Saturday from Drake Caggiula, resulting in a one-game suspension for Caggiula.
Catch the Oilers and Hawks Monday on 630 CHED with the Face-off Show at 6 p.m. The puck drops at 8:30 p.m.
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