- Oilers winger Josh Archibald has been given a clean bill of health from doctors after his bout with myocarditis, reports Jim Matheson of the Edmonton Journal. However, it’s still believed that his COVID vaccination status would limit his usefulness to Edmonton as he’d basically be restricted to Canadian-based games only. Accordingly, the pending UFA – who carries a $1.5MM cap hit – may be more useful on a team based out of the United States although his trade value would certainly be limited. Archibald is currently quarantining and will need some time to get into playing condition so he can remain on LTIR for the time being.
Oilers Rumors
Snapshots: Niemelainen, Goloubef, Debunked Rumors
The wallet of Edmonton Oilers defenseman Markus Niemelainen is a little lighter today. The NHL Department of Player Safety announced today that Niemelainen has been fined $2043.75 for cross-checking, the maximum fine allowed under the terms of the CBA. The incident in question occurred during the Oilers’ match-up with the Winnipeg Jets on Saturday. Niemelainen cross-checked Jets forward and fellow Finn Kristian Vesalainen in the third period as he cut toward the net on a scoring chance. Despite what in retrospect was an obvious and vicious cross-check to Vesalainen’s face, no penalty was called on the play. Niemelainen is somewhat fortunate to have escaped with only a fine in this situation.
- Following multiple PTO’s with the AHL’s Belleville Senators this season, including suiting up for 11 games, veteran defenseman Cody Goloubef finally has a contract – except it isn’t with Belleville nor with Ottawa. Instead, the 32-year-old has signed a contract with SC Bern of the Swiss National League for the remainder of the season. Goloubef undoubtedly had his sights set on a return to Ottawa, having played in 29 games with the club over the last three seasons, but for whatever reason that did not come to fruition. An alternate captain for Belleville last season, Goloubef clearly still has strong ties to the Senators organization but it is unknown if he was offered a contract with the AHL Sens and opted to go to Switzerland instead. Bern gains a two-way defender with 160 NHL games to his credit as they fight to earn a playoff berth.
- The nearer to the trade deadline, the more rumors begin to emerge and, of course, not all rumors are grounded in truth. Two such whispers that were put to rest this weekend revolved around Ottawa Senators defenseman Artem Zub and Chicago Blackhawks forward Brandon Hagel. While both the Sens and the Hawks are struggling again this season expect to be sellers at the deadline, they aren’t eager to move cost-controlled assets that are actually contributing on a regular basis. The Ottawa Sun’s Bruce Garrioch reports rather definitively that Zub will not be moved this season, which makes perfect sense. The 26-year-old is signed through next season at $2.5MM and while he will be an unrestricted free agent at that time, possibly making him a deadline target next season, the Senators don’t want to move on too quickly from a blue liner playing top pair minutes while also leading the team in plus/minus. In Chicago, the Blackhawks have even less reason to trade young winger Hagel, signed on for just $1.5MM AAV for two more years and still a restricted free agent after that. The 23-year-old is fourth on the team in scoring and second in goals, shooting percentage, and Corsi. While Chicago is understandably receiving interest in Hagel, The Athletic’s Mark Lazerus reports that they have zero interest in moving him.
Dave Tippett Reportedly Plans To Retire From Coaching Career
PHNX Sports’ Craig Morgan tweeted Saturday night that former NHL head coach Dave Tippett, who was let go by the Edmonton Oilers earlier in the season, plans to retire from his coaching career.
If true, that would conclude a 17-year NHL head coaching career for the now 60-year-old Tippett. He was fired by the Oilers after a 23-18-3 start to the season.
Tippett, a longtime NHL player as well, got his first crack as a head coach in the 2002-03 season with the Dallas Stars. After six seasons in Dallas, Tippett joined the Coyotes organization for the next eight years, serving as their head coach from 2009-2017. There, he guided the team to the 2012 Western Conference Finals and was the Jack Adams Award winner in 2010, his first year in Phoenix/Arizona. That year remains the only 50-win, 100-point season in franchise history.
Through 1,285 games as a head coach in the NHL, Tippett finishes with a 648-475-162 record. It’s an all-time points percentage of .567. In 82 playoff games, Tippett went 34-48.
Oilers Recall Colton Sceviour
- The Oilers announced (Twitter link) that they’ve recalled winger Colton Sceviour from Bakersfield of the AHL. The veteran had actually been handed a two-game suspension for a hit on Canucks prospect Jack Rathbone earlier this week but has yet to serve either of those games. Sceviour has two goals and three assists in 30 games with Edmonton this season plus a pair of helpers in four AHL contests.
Jesse Puljujarvi Out Four Weeks With Lower-Body Injury
The Edmonton Oilers are starting to move in the right direction but they’ll have to do it without Jesse Puljujarvi for the next little while. Head coach Jay Woodcroft told reporters today that Puljujarvi’s lower-body injury will keep him out about four weeks.
Since Woodcroft took over four games ago, Puljujarvi already had three points before exiting last night’s match against the Anaheim Ducks early. The fourth-overall pick from 2016 was finally starting to come into his own this season, racking up 12 goals and 28 points through 46 games while playing a career-high in minutes. A frustrating case of mismanagement early in his career, it appears as though the Oilers and the young forward have finally figured out how to best use his rare blend of speed, size, and skill.
Losing him now will also throw a wrench in the lines for Edmonton, which had finally seemed like a cohesive four-unit group the last few games. Jason Gregor of TSN believes that Ryan McLeod might be bumped up the lineup, giving him a huge opportunity to establish himself further at the NHL level. The team also has Brendan Perlini, who hasn’t played since January 25, as an option to re-enter the lineup.
In a season like a roller coaster, the Oilers are currently on a four-game winning streak and now have retaken the third spot in the Pacific Division playoff race. That streak will be tested soon enough though, as after tomorrow’s game against the Winnipeg Jets, the team has a brutal stretch with games against the Minnesota Wild, Tampa Bay Lightning, Florida Panthers, and Carolina Hurricanes, all teams positioning themselves as Stanley Cup contenders. They’ll have to go through those matches without Puljujarvi.
Brad Malone, Justin Dowling Clear Waivers
Feb 11: Malone and Dowling have both cleared, according to Friedman. They can now be assigned to the minor leagues.
Feb 10: The waiver wire has two players on it today, as Brad Malone of the Edmonton Oilers and Justin Dowling of the Vancouver Canucks are both available for claim according to Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet. If Malone’s name surprises you, it should; the veteran forward had been playing on an AHL contract but has now signed a one-year, two-way, NHL deal with the Oilers. In order to return to Bakersfield for the time being, he needs to clear waivers after signing the new deal.
Malone, 32, is the captain of the Condors, meaning he likely has a close relationship with Jay Woodcroft, who is now taking over as head coach of the Oilers after Dave Tippett was let go earlier today. That isn’t necessarily the reason for this contract though, as reports had surfaced much earlier in the year that Edmonton wanted to sign Malone to an NHL deal but couldn’t for salary cap reasons. Still, Woodcroft’s promotion could certainly mean that there is a bit of NHL playing time in Malone’s future, depending on what happens with the rest of the roster.
If he does come back up at some point, it certainly wouldn’t be a new experience. Malone has more than 200 NHL games under his belt to this point, including some playoff contests back when he was with the Colorado Avalanche organization. He played 16 games with the Oilers in 2018-19, his last appearance in the NHL.
Dowling meanwhile has played in 22 games with the Canucks this season, including last night’s loss against the New York Islanders. He has just two goals and four points in those matches, while usually seeing less than ten minutes of ice time. Because he’s in just the first season of a two-year, one-way contract, it seems unlikely that another team would claim him unless they feel he can make an immediate impact in the lineup. The 31-year-old has just 18 points in 98 career regular season games.
Zack Kassian, Duncan Keith Out Multiple Weeks
5:38 pm: The team also announced that they’ve moved forward Kyle Turris to injured reserve. He’s only played four games since the beginning of January but has been a healthy scratch for most of the time. The nature of his injury is unknown. To fill his roster spot, the team recalled defenseman Philip Broberg from the AHL.
2:41 pm: The Edmonton Oilers will be without Zack Kassian and Duncan Keith for the next several weeks, general manager Ken Holland announced today. Kassian is dealing with a broken jaw that will keep him out four to six weeks, while Keith is in concussion protocol, has upper-body soreness and could miss two to four weeks. The Oilers will recall Markus Niemelainen from Bakersfield to fill one of the roster spots.
Kassian, 31, left last night’s game after playing just 4:52 of ice time, though that wasn’t all that far off from what he had been receiving of late anyway. The veteran forward has just five goals and 14 points through 35 games and will now end up missing at least a month with this latest injury. In the second season of a four-year, $12.8MM contract signed in 2020, Kassian is actually the fifth-highest paid forward on the Oilers. That salary won’t result in much offense this season given this latest absence, especially if he falls closer to the six-week timeline and misses a good chunk of March.
Keith meanwhile might be a bigger loss, even though the 38-year-old is a shadow of the player that helped lead the Chicago Blackhawks to three Stanley Cup championships. The Oilers simply don’t have the defensive depth to lose a top-four option long-term, unless a younger player is able to take a step forward and take on a good chunk of responsibility.
Perhaps that will happen with new interim head coach Jay Woodcroft taking over and defensive coach Dave Manson coming along with him. Niemelainen will obviously be very familiar with both from their time in Bakersfield, though the 23-year-old has just seven games of experience at the NHL level.
Edmonton Oilers Fire Dave Tippett
The Edmonton Oilers have had enough, and Ken Holland has finally fired a coach. Dave Tippett is out, according to Darren Dreger of TSN, after another embarrassing loss last night. The Oilers managed 41 shots but fell 4-1 to the Chicago Blackhawks, allowing early powerplay goals in both the first and third periods. Dreger adds that Jim Playfair has also been fired, while Jay Woodcroft and Dave Manson from the Bakersfield Condors will take over as head coach and assistant respectively. In a release that followed, the team confirmed the dismissal of Tippett and Playfair, adding that assistants Glen Gulutzan and Brian Wiseman will remain with the team.
Tippett, 60, was in his third year as head coach of Edmonton and had thus far put up a 95-62-14 record. While that doesn’t look bad overall, the 23-18-3 mark this season just hasn’t been good enough for a team led by Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl. The team has struggled to defend, has had a carousel of inconsistency in net, and still doesn’t have the secondary scoring required to contend for the Stanley Cup. While a lot of that is due to poor roster construction, Tippett will pay the price after some of his deployment concerns.
Mike Smith started both ends of a back-to-back over the last two days, despite him just coming back off an injury recently. He lost both, allowing four goals in each, and now has an .890 save percentage on the season. Smith has been connected to Tippett for years, and hasn’t been able to play to the level he showed last season.
Notably, the veteran coach’s contract expired at the end of the season anyway, one that was unlikely to be renewed given the way the Oilers have performed this year.
Woodcroft comes in as a fresh face, having never been a head coach at the NHL level. He has been in charge of the Condors since 2018 and previously served as an assistant with the Oilers and Sharks, but those aren’t the most interesting assignments on his resume. It’s the years he spent with the Detroit Red Wings that stick out here given he’s now being promoted by Holland. Woodcroft was a video coach with the Red Wings right after his playing career came to an end, and comes from that coaching tree that spawned Todd McLellan, who eventually brought him to San Jose and then Edmonton.
This is the first time that Holland has fired a coach in the NHL, something he has been vehemently against in the past. At a press conference earlier this year, he suggested that dismissing Tippett wouldn’t be the answer and that the Oilers couldn’t “keep whipping through coaches” to try and solve the problem. Well, they are now on the seventh coach since the 2012-13 lockout, as Woodcroft will follow Tippett, Ken Hitchcock, McLellan, Todd Nelson, Dallas Eakins, and Ralph Krueger trying to get the best out of a frustrating lineup.
Mikko Koskinen Placed In COVID Protocol
The Edmonton Oilers got some good news when Mike Smith was activated from injured reserve today but it comes with a downside–Mikko Koskinen has now been placed in the COVID protocol. Jason Gregor of TSN reports that Stuart Skinner will be recalled as the second goaltender with Smith starting tomorrow against the Vegas Golden Knights.
That likely means that it will be Skinner on Wednesday against the Chicago Blackhawks as the Oilers try to string some wins together coming out of the break. Though Koskinen has seen his fair share of criticism this season, he should also get some serious credit for the run he had going into the break.
Over his last five games, Koskinen went 4-0-1 with a .920 save percentage, essentially saving the Oilers’ season from completely spiraling out of control. With him out, the team will have to hope that Smith–who has played three games since October–and Skinner can hold the fort and get them off to a good start in the second half of the season.
Edmonton is one of the teams with several games in hand at this point, having only played 42 to this point. The condensed schedule really comes quickly, as they’ll play five games by February 15. The worst part of this timing is that it’s added onto the end of the scheduled All-Star break, meaning it will be nearly two weeks from his last game when Koskinen is even eligible to return.
Mike Smith To Return After All-Star Break
- Postmedia’s Robert Tychkowski examines some of the storylines for the Oilers for the second half of the season and naturally, goaltending is among them. While he notes that Mike Smith will be able to return – a welcome addition – even that may not be enough to sustain their goaltending situation. Edmonton has 40 games remaining due to a lot of COVID-related postponements so they will need to rely on two goalies consistently, especially with Smith being 39 and just coming back from injury. With that in mind, it wouldn’t be surprising to see GM Ken Holland try to shore up the backup goalie position over the next few weeks though they will need to offload Mikko Koskinen’s contract to be able to afford any newcomers.