The Oilers have lost key veterans — and forgotten how to be a team

EDMONTON — It’s a dynamic they’ve never been able to figure out here in Edmonton, going all the way back to the days when they handed the keys to the car to a bunch of teenagers named Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. 

Back then the veterans became alienated, and lost ice time for making mistakes the kids made every night. And the team, well, it wasn’t close to being any good. 

Because it wasn’t a team. It was a few elite guys, and the rest were simply “the help.” 

Today, the Oilers’ drivers are far more elite. And players like Zach Hyman, Evander Kane and Nugent-Hopkins give the Oilers as high-end a Top 6 as there is in the game. 

But as a “team” Edmonton has faltered. They’re becoming just a few high-end guys and a roster that can’t win unless the two big guys win it for them. 

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They held a players-only meeting before Wednesday’s practice, on the heels of another noncommittal, soft and disinterested loss the night before. 

There are issues here, both on the ice and off. 

This team doesn’t have enough bite. It’s easy to play against, with a supporting cast that is both distinctly vanilla and of the mind that they can’t impact things around here anyhow. 

On the ice, nobody hits or fights, and nobody stands up for each other or holds each other accountable for same. Losing Kane has exacerbated this issue. 

But without Kane, and voices like Mike Smith, Duncan Keith and even the quiet veteran Kris Russell, it has become a bit of a country club in Edmonton, where the stars take up so much of the spotlight that there’s likely too much shade for everyone else to exist in. 

Where is that teammate to demand that Bouchard, who is nearing the 150-game mark in his career, simply use his six-foot-three frame to take the body now and again? 

Who challenges Warren Foegele on why he won’t stand over a fallen goalie once in a while, or intimidate a smaller opponent? 

Why doesn’t somebody — anybody — drop everything and go after MacKenzie Weegar when he sticks a knee out on Connor McDavid in a game at Calgary, no less? 

This team has only one way to change the momentum in a game: by scoring. Nobody changes momentum any other way — with a hit, a fight or some other bit of hockey currency. 

So it becomes a vicious cycle, because it’s the same guys who do all the scoring. When the game gets away, the same guys get leaned on, while the same guys stop playing. 

Why doesn’t this team act more like a team? Why doesn’t it play more like a team? 

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There’s an old hockey cliché, about teams that “play for each other.” 

Well, they don’t play for each other in Edmonton, because they still haven’t figured it out here. 

This coaching staff is travelling the same road that they have all travelled. Dave Tippett, Todd McLellan — all of them: 

When McDavid and Leon Draisaitl fill the net, well, it’s their night and we watch them dazzle. When they don’t fill the net, and the team falls behind, then they play 10 minutes of the third period against Seattle on Tuesday, because the team needs goals. 

Klim Kostin, the most involved role player of late, got two shifts and 62 seconds of ice time in that third period. Foegele had four shifts, Holloway (who took a double-minor penalty) had three. 

You understand why it happens that way. But what you also need to understand is that a team means everybody, not just a few somebodies. 

“Participants,” as Ken Hitchcock used to say. A coach needs to have 20 players who all feel like “participants.” 

And that’s still a problem here in Edmonton, perhaps the biggest reason why a team that went to the Final Four a season ago can’t figure it out less than a year later. There are no analytics to measure what they lost in Keith, Smith and Russell. 

“We lost a lot of, you know, big presences,” veteran Tyson Barrie said on Wednesday. “A lot of games (played), a lot of veterans. But it’s our turn now. It’s up to the guys that are left in this room, who are the leaders to step outside of your comfort zone a little bit and become the guy that’s going to be fired up and hold guys accountable. Even if it’s hard. 

“I’m a pretty easygoing, carefree guy. But I’m the second oldest guy on the team now,” Barrie said, “and they look to me for leadership. If I’ve got to step up and say something — or be the bad guy — I’m certainly not afraid to do that either.” 

This isn’t a McDavid and Draisaitl thing. They would both trade any Art Ross or Hart Trophies for a Stanley Cup in a heartbeat. 

They don’t build the team beneath them. They don’t dole out ice time, and they don’t provide the opportunities for others to feel like this is their team too. 

They don’t create a meritocracy like the one that sees Markus Niemelainen make a mistake and sit for a period, or maybe a game, while Darnell Nurse can cost the Oilers a game with not one but two derelict defensive plays (See: St. Louis, Dec. 15), and not only does he reach 29 minutes of ice time in that game but gets another 22 minutes the next. 

With the halfway point of the season around the corner, it’s time for a long look in the mirror here in Edmonton. 

Why don’t they fight for each other? 

Why don’t they sacrifice for each other? 

Why, whenever times get tough, does half this team turn into spectators? 

This isn’t the team it was last season. It’s barely a team at all, on too many nights. 

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