Game 60 Preview: Oil Stains

The Edmonton Oilers come to town to kick off a 4-game ‘Dome stand for the Flames, the longest remaining this season for the Flames. The Oilers’ struggles against the Flames (and, well, the rest of the league) are extremely well-documented, so I won’t go into them here.

One of Edmonton's most consistent point producers over the past decade has been Ales Hemsky. The reason I bring this up is because I find it fascinating just how different the media's relationship with the team in Edmonton compared with the team in Calgary is. The Edmonton media has a long-running tradition of running players out of town who are suspected to be "soft", or "grumpy" or any other number of words. Before Hemsky, it was Smyth and Souray…the list goes on and on. It truly does seem like the media dictates some actions of the team. In Calgary, we all know how the media and team interact.

The Oilers actually have quite the PP this year, riding Ryan Nugent-Hopkins‘ et al’s hot start to 4th in the league, converting at a 20.8% clip. Calgary’s PP has dropped off in the past couple weeks, going from 13th in the league to 16th, converting on 16.9% of their opportunities. Yann Danis looks as though he may get the start tonight based on practice.

The Flames need to continue their lucky streak in order to keep pace with the rest of the confrence and maintain a playoff spot. (Helping them with that is Darcy Hordichuk’s inexplicable return to the Edmonton lineup.) Miikka Kiprusoff should have a little bit of a break tonight, but probably still needs to stay relatively sharp due to the players in front of him.

More video and some audio after the jump.

Players To Watch

Mike Cammalleri-The Forward is currently riding a 4 game point streak, with three goals and one assist during that span.

Taylor Hall-The best forward on the Oilers, no question.

Chris Butler Audio

Lastly…

This is as close to a gimmie as there is. The Flames need to take advantage.

by Richard Hammond