Edmonton Oilers crushed in Overtime by the same old thing that crushed them all year

Article content

The Edmonton Oilers were crushed in their loss to the Los Angeles Kings by the same old thing that crushed them all year, particularly early on when Jay Woodcroft lost his job because of it.

Edmonton allowed three rush goals against in Thursday’s 5-4 overtime loss to the Kings, most notoriously Anze Kopitar’s overtime goal, where the Kings ace attacker charged by Edmonton d-man Darnell Nurse to score on Oilers goalie Stuart Skinner.

Article content

Article content

Article content

Article content

Nurse is taking a tremendous amount of criticism for his slow read on Kopitar. It allowed the Kings forward open ice, time and space, and he made the most of it.

There’s no doubt that Nurse was a heartbeat slow in recognizing and responding to the danger. If he’d been on his toes he’d have been able to head off Kopitar, given Nurse’s agility. It’s the kind of defensive stop he regularly makes.

But a few questions arise from this mass public dressing down of Nurse on this play.

Through the season, how did the Oilers do when it comes to rush chances against? And how did Nurse himself do? And just how crucial was his misread to the overall outcome of the game?

Oilers vs the rush 2023-24

Edmonton scored 89 goals on the rush at even strength this year and gave up 94. It was pretty much a saw-off, which isn’t great considering that the Oilers are led by master rush attacker Connor McDavid.

But much of the trouble in this regard came in Jay Woodcroft’s disastrous first 13 games, Edmonton gave up 23 goals against at even strength on the rush and scored just eight.

How did Nurse do against the rush?

Article content

No Oilers player made a higher rate of mistakes leading to Grade A shots on the rush at even strength than did Darnell Nurse.

Nurse averaged 0.79 per game, but that wasn’t significantly worse than Evan Bouchard and Mattias Ekholm, both at 0.76 per game.

More defensive d-men like Vincent Desharnais, 0.54 per game, and Cody Ceci, 0.59 per game, made a lower rate of such mistakes.

It’s evident that high octane offensive players tend to be make a higher rate of mistakes that lead to Grade A rush shots against. The highest total for forwards belongs to Leon Draisaitl and Connor McDavid, for example. Their focus is on scoring, so their risk vs reward is going to tilt to taking more risks. The same goes for Bouchard and Ekholm, who are counted on to make plays at the offensive blueline on the attack. This is less of an excuse for Nurse who is counted on, mainly, to be a shut-down d-man against top attackers.

His high rate of major mistakes on Grade A shots on rush chances speaks to a need for him to recalibrate his risk vs reward somewhat and to limit mistakes up-ice leading to such Grade A shots.

Article content

How crucial was Nurse’s OT mistake?

Of course it was crucial. It came in overtime. He didn’t get the job done.

At the same time, there were all kinds of equally or worse defensive mistakes made this game, such as Evan Bouchard’s turnover on the first goal against, or Ryan Nugent-Hopkins’ slow backcheck on Drew Doughty on the third Kings goal.

and

Article content

The second Kings’ goal was also a rush chance, created largely because Warren Foegele skated for a brief moment in the wrong direction in the offensive zone, attacking towards the net when he should have realized he was the high forward in the zone and guarded against the rush.

Article content

Bouchard, RNH, Foegele and Nurse all made similar mistakes. In a split second, they made the wrong read and the wrong play.

Hockey happens fast and players are brutally punished for split second decisions.

It’s worth noting that until his mistake in OT, Nurse had not made a single mistake leading to a Grade A shot for the Kings. He and his defensive partner Cody Ceci were killing it on defence, playing excellent shutdown defence, doing exactly what they’re paid to do.

Nurse is rightly taking a lot of heat here but if you’re blaming him for the loss, you’re out of line. Edmonton only got to overtime, in no small part, because he and Ceci and been playing so well this game.

Article content