Kris Knoblauch past his 'best before' date as Edmonton Oilers coach? Hmm

Game Day 23: Oilers vs Tampa

The Oilers are going through a rough patch just now, with tough games coming up tonight against Tampa and on Saturday against Florida.

Edmonton ranks 27th out of 32 NHL teams for NHL points percentage, and are 11th in the Western Conference, ahead of three teams that are now seriously considering selling off veteran players and tanking for a top draft pick. The Oilers have already traded away their top draft pick for 2026, though it is lottery protected if it falls in the first 12 picks.

Is head coach Kris Knoblauch going to survive this stretch of rancid play? This is, after all, an era of impatience for the Oilers, the heart of the McDavid/Draisaitl era where competing for the Stanley Cup is a must-do every single season, and coaches who stumble out of the gate don’t make it far into the season.

To his and his Oilers credit, Knoblauch has two years in a row taken the team to the Stanley Cup Final, something not accomplished in Edmonton since 1988. That’s nothing to sneer at which I suspect is why a majority of hockey fans think Knoblauch will ride out this rough patch and hold his job.

That said, it’s worth noting how impatient Oil Country, not to mention upper Oil management, has been during the McDavid/Draisaitl era.

Todd McLellan lasted 266 regular season games over 3.2 seasons. Knoblauch has lasted 172 games so far over 2.2 seasons. Dave Tippett 171 games over 2.5 seasons, Jay Woodcroft lasted 133 games over 1.8 seasons, and Ken Hitchcock just 62 games in part of one season.

coaches

Knoblauch’s problem this year? The even strength play of the Oilers has collapsed.

When he took over from Jay Woodcroft in November 2023, the Oilers became an even strength powerhouse, with a Grade A shots differential of +3.5 per game and a goals differential of +0.7 per game. But in the first 22 games this year, the Oilers are an even strength weakling, -0.9 Grade A shots per game, and -0.7 goals per game.

They’re down 4.4 Grade A shots at even strength per game from the 2023-24 high under Knoblauch and down 1.4 even strength goals per game.

This is nothing short of a disaster for an NHL team, the difference between a Stanley Cup Finalist and a team ranked 27th out of 32 teams.

Even Strength

How to fix it?

My own best guess is that the loss of coaches Glen Gulutzan and especially Paul Coffey has had a massive negative impact, though it’s worth noting the Oilers also had a weak start last year with Gulutzan and Coffey on board. It’s also worth noting that the power play is still cooking, which was Gulutzan’s main area, but the team’s d-man unit is the weakest link now, and that was Coffey’s area.

Hockey fan Rob Suggitt also noted the harshness of Edmonton’s schedule to date: “Oilers will have played 16 out of 24 games on the road by Saturday. Oilers have a decent home record (5-1-2), only one regulation loss on home ice. They have a ton of home games coming up, especially the month of January.”

There are now shortages of theories, but at this point the centres and wingers have dropped in terms of their two-way play and the d-men have cratered. They’re all collectively creating less on the attack and making more mistakes to leak more Grade A shots against, and all this is independent from the iffy play of Oilers goalies Stuart Skinner and Calvin Pickard.

Whatever it is ailing the Oilers, it is serious, it is pressing, it is tanking the team and if Knoblauch and the players don’t fix it in the next month, Edmonton will have a new coach faster than you can say Max and Doug Bentley.