Edmonton Oilers: How to beat the Blackhawks in Qualifying Round
The Edmonton Oilers have what it takes to get past the Chicago Blackhawks.
Hockey will be returning sooner rather than later. Whenever it does, the Edmonton Oilers will be squaring off against the Chicago Blackhawks in the play-in round of the 2020 Stanley Cup Playoffs. And the Oilers have a great chance of beating the Blackhawks.
Let’s get started by saying the 24 team format is absolutely unfair to Edmonton. They were the second best team in the Pacific Division and actually had more points than the Dallas Stars, who are getting a play-in round bye. However, thanks to point percentage, the Oilers are stuck playing the Blackhawks, who probably have no business being in the postseason anyway.
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At the start of the hiatus, the Hawks were six points out of the second wild card spot in the Western Conference with 12 games left. That’s not an impossible deficit to make up, but it would have required a lot of things to go right for the Blackhawks to make the postseason. I’m honestly surprised the Oilers approved the 24-team format because they’re one of the teams who it screws over.
Now, with that said, the Oilers have an excellent chance of beating the Blackhawks. Of course, anything can happen in a best of five series, but Edmonton’s advantages are overwhelming, and on paper, it’s hard not to consider them the favorites to win the series.
Offense is probably Chicago’s biggest strength at this point. Well, guess what? The Oilers are even better. Chicago ranks 18th in goals per game and 28th in power play percentage. Edmonton ranks 15th in the former and first in the latter. Since the start of February, the Blackhawks are 13th in the league in goals per game while the Oilers rank 10th.
Defensively, the Oilers are a bit of a mess. But with players getting healthy, that should help. And guess what? The Blackhawks are even more of a mess than the Oilers defensively. They’ve allowed a NHL-high 35.1 shots against per game.
Ultimately, goaltending’s going to play a pretty huge part in this series. Now, while Blackhawks goaltender Corey Crawford has been strong this season, he hasn’t been able to overcome their deficiencies. He has a very respectable .917% save percentage, yet still allows 2.77 goals against per game.
Mike Smith (.902% save percentage) doesn’t inspire much confidence, but at least the Oilers have two viable goaltending options. Mikko Koskinen has been impressive this season after a rough first year back in North America. Koskinen will probably be the starter going into the series, but Smith gives them a solid backup plan.
Neither team has the advantage as far as depth. They’re both pretty much two line teams. So obviously, the stars are going to play a huge role in how it turns out. Patrick Kane is still one of the greatest players in the NHL and Jonathan Toews is quietly still pretty darn good, but the Oilers have the firepower to outduel them between Art Ross Trophy winner Leon Draisaitl, Connor McDavid, and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins.
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Again, a five game series is basically a roll of the dice. But this dice happens to be rigged towards the Oilers.