'There might not be a more scrutinized player': Edmonton Oilers veteran under the gun
This in from NHL insider Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet, talking to Bob Stauffer on Oilers Now about Stuart Skinner, and how no other NHL player may be more under the gun right now than the Edmonton Oilers goalie.
Skinner let in one soft goal on a rebound against Buffalo on Monday, a night when the Sabres goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen stole a 3-2 win for his team, UPL facing 20 Grade A shots (five hitting the post) as opposed to nine Grade A shots on Skinner.
'You know, he made some really good saves,' Friedman said of Skinner, 'But he gave up some really rough goals and they lost. So that's what we're focusing on right now. Like, you know, the Oilers made a choice at the deadline, and I think it was a defensible one, with what I think was potentially available to them in goal. They said, 'When you add in the acquisition cost, it just wasn't worth it.' I think it is — from what I can tell, knowing I don't know everything — I think you can say it's at least a defensible position. You know, I know a lot of people talk about (Anaheim goalie John) Gibson, but the health thing is, it's a thing.
'You know, I think right now, as we go into the last 20 games of the regular season and head towards the playoffs, there might not be a more scrutinized player in the league than Stuart Skinner.'
1. Friedman is connected as they come, and as observant as anyone, so he's in as good a spot as anyone to gauge which NHL player has the most pressure on him.
If he says it's Skinner, I'll buy that, that makes sense.
Of course, all kinds of Oilers have immense pressure on them, from Connor McDavid to Evan Bouchard, from Viktor Arvidsson to Calvin Pickard. It's the nature of this market to focus with unholy intensity on the performance of each player. But I agree that the level of scrutiny on Skinner is the most of any Oilers player right now.
2. Skinner faced even greater pressure last year against Vancouver in the playoffs when he played so poorly early on but was bailed out by Pickard and game back to help win the series for the Oilers. He then starred in the Dallas series, and held his own in the seven game Stanley Cup Final.
I take it as good news that Skinner has once faced such heat but he survived it well enough.
3. Skinner has always been a hot and cold NHLer, prone to long slumps and long runs of strong play. This year he's had two extended slumps, 12 games to start the year and now his last ten games, while also going on one 20 game run of super solid play from mid-November to the end of January. T
here's nothing to say he won't get hot in the playoffs and go on a run of strong games.
4. The Oilers defence has been terrible in the past month, just as both Skinner and Pickard have struggled in net.
I wondered how much their struggles might be related to team play in front of them, so I dug into this.
During Skinner's two extended slumps this year, the Oilers as a team played 31 games, creating 15.6 Grade A shots per game, giving up 12.7 Grade A shots per game, a +2.9 Grade A shots per game differential.
When Skinner was on a hot streak, the Oilers played 30 games, creating 16 Grade A shots per game, while giving up 11.7, a +4.3 Grade A shots differential.
That's somewhat of a difference, +2.9 Grade A shots per game differential when Skinner has been cold, +4.3 when he's been hot.
If the Oilers can pick it up on defence — and they have zero chance to win the Stanley Cup if they don't get their rush defence in order — I suspect that will go some way in helping Skinner out of his current slump. But the rest has got to come from Skinner. He's got to find a way to avoid letting in a bad goal or two each game as he's done throughout this slump.
The good news is he got it together before under even more pressure, so he's evidently got the focus, mindset, intestinal fortitude and technique to do it again.
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