EDMONTON — The Mike Babcock era began with a loud voice and constant demand Thursday, as the latest head coach to try to get the Edmonton Oilers over the top ran his first practice.
“What we’re trying to do is send the message on how we want to play,” began Babcock. “We’ve asked them to learn the details and then find your game within our game. So if you know the details and everyone’s detailed, everybody on the team can be important.
“When you’re not detailed enough, no one knows where to go. And only the best guys get to be important.”
Get used to that theme, folks, as Babcock tries to do what so many have failed at here: empowering the entire roster to have a role in the fate of the team — not just the top guys.
“We’re going to play without the puck, and in order to play here, you’ve got to be fit,” Babcock declared. “We’re going to play 12 forwards, and everyone’s going to be important. So you have to have a role, and you have to understand what we expect.”
Babcock opened with Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl on a line with Vasiliy Podkolzin, and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins centring Zach Hyman and Ike Howard.
“I’m going to try to start with the two of them together for sure,” he said of No’s 97 and 29. “The third piece on each one of those top three lines, I don’t know.”
No one is taking anything for granted in Edmonton this fall, perhaps a metaphor for the season to come.
“That’s your everyday, right?” said Draisaitl. “Your everyday is the practices, the details, the little things that have gotten away from us a little bit over the last couple of years. Now is the time to dial these back in.”
“That was his big message today,” added defenceman Ryan Shea. “Everything was upbeat. He wanted everything quick, and just the little things. He wants everyone finishing the drill, stopping at the net… Everything that it takes to be a good player and a good team, he was harping on.”
One notable change was the pairing of Evan Bouchard with Shea, and Mattias Ekholm — Bouchard’s partner for three years — playing alongside young newcomer Shakir Mukhamadullin.
Was that a sign that the veteran Ekholm will slip down the lineup?
“Ecky’s hanging out with Shaq because Shaq’s a new guy … but there’s no indication of what the pairs will be,” Babcock said. “We’ve got new players, and we want them to feel comfortable. Ekholm’s a man. He’s a real leader. He can help the kid get going.”
Speaking of Shea, he may be one of Stan Bowman’s most intriguing acquisitions over the summer. He’s an older cat — he turns 30 in February — who has been allowed to walk away as a free agent by Chicago, then Dallas, and now Pittsburgh.
But when you talk to folks in Pittsburgh, they’ll tell you he was one of the Penguins’ most consistent blue-liners last season, and an excellent defender.
“It’s just confidence,” said Shea, who has just 150 NHL games on his resume. “That coaching staff, that team, gave me confidence last year. I know it’s been in me the whole time, and right now there’s no reason for my confidence to be any lower than it was last year. I’m ready to go. I’m ready to help this team win.”
Bouchard led the Oilers in even-strength time on ice last season, logging 19:15 per game. But Darnell Nurse averaged 19:14, and with him in San Jose there’s nearly 20 minutes of ice time to be accounted for.
Cue Shea, and if he sticks with Bouchard, he will have to be that pairing’s defensive conscience, while hopping the boards for 26 or 27 shifts per night. Shea was excellent defensively as a Penguin, but only averaged 16:27 of even-strength TOI last year.
“I know what I do well, and I’m sure (the coaches) have watched plenty of tape. I’ll just play my role, whatever that may be,” said Shea, whose confidence was not hindered when he showed up at the rink Thursday and saw his name next to the franchise’s No. 1 D-man. “It definitely doesn’t go down, that’s for sure.”
Here are your lines and pairings on Day 1 of Oilers camp:
Draisaitl-McDavid-Podkolzin
Formenton-Dach-Joseph
Jones-Samanski-Hutson
Tralmaks-Nicholl-Berzkalns
Lewandowski, Bookman
Shea-Bouchard
Stastney-Emberson
Stillman-Brown
Carfagna-Robinson
Howard-Nugent-Hopkins-Hyman
Frederic-Dickinson-Kapanen
Griffith-Pitlick-Michaels/Harvey
Raty-Marjala-Stonehouse/Tassy
Walman-Murphy
Ekholm-Mukhamadullin
Leppanen- Cibulka
Sjolund-Akey
Getting injured just a couple of weeks after arriving in Edmonton last season was the wrench in Tristan Jarry’s gears that he just didn’t need. From there, his game went south, and he eventually lost the starter’s net to Connor Ingram.
Jarry got into just one playoff game, and then the team acquired Frederik Andersen and Devon Levi in the off-season, which speaks to the Oilers’ trust level in Jarry.
“It wasn’t the ending that I wanted to my season,” Jarry said. “After I got injured, it was tough. Going back and being able to rehab the injury … I just didn’t really feel like myself.”
Jarry was set up to enter a three-goalie system, the first ever in these parts, until Andersen came up injured this summer. Like it or not, Jarry is now the clear No. 1 in Edmonton, with Levi — who has just 39 career NHL games of experience — as his backup.
It isn’t the first time that Jarry has had to battle for an Opening Night start in this league. But at age 31, if he doesn’t make the most of this season, it may be his last chance at one.
“You want to start every game. That’s the mindset,” said Jarry, who was in Edmonton the entire summer training for a season that will tell us much about where his career goes from here. “You play the game to play, (and) there can only be one (goalie) at a time playing. But you have to earn it.
“Throughout training camp and throughout the pre-season games, that’s what has to happen.”