The Columbus Blue Jackets’ road trip nightmare continued Monday night, blowing a two-goal lead to lose 5-4 in overtime against the Edmonton Oilers. It was their fourth straight loss, all on this road trip, dropping their record to 7-7-1.
Related: Oilers Come Back to Win 5-4 Over Blue Jackets in OT
Former Blue Jacket Jack Roslovic buried the overtime breakaway winner, while Connor McDavid and Jake Walman each scored twice to lead Edmonton’s comeback. Stuart Skinner didn’t have a great night but picked up the win, stopping 15 of 19 shots.
Ivan Provorov, Sean Monahan, Boone Jenner, and Adam Fantilli scored for Columbus, while Jet Greaves stopped 19 of 24 shots in the loss.
Games Mismanagement Strikes Again
For about 45 to 50 minutes, the Blue Jackets were the better team. They dictated the play and overall outworked the Oilers through two periods, even drawing boos from the home crowd at Rogers Place heading into the second intermission. But then it all fell apart.
In the third period, the Blue Jackets played passively instead of trying to win, and it showed in their sloppy play. The Oilers flipped the momentum and outshot the Blue Jackets 9-6 in the third after being outplayed earlier.
However, the second period was about as dominant as the Blue Jackets have looked all season. They outshot the Oilers 12-5, cycled in the offensive zone, and kept their lines in for long stretches. Jenner’s goal came after a line change where the Blue Jackets held the zone, tipping in a Dante Fabbro shot. Earlier, Monahan capitalized on the Oilers’ weaker off-the-rush defense, knocking in a rebound off a Kent Johnson shot off Skinner’s blocker.
But when the game was there to close out, the Blue Jackets just couldn’t do it. A late power play was their chance to ice it, yet instead, they gave up a shorthanded goal off a brutal turnover along the boards in deep. The power play continues to be an issue (13.9% on the season) and completely failed in yet another critical moment, finishing 0-for-2 on the game.
Defensively, the Blue Jackets played well for two periods, blocking 13 shots total and limiting chances, but the Oilers simply sacrificed more. They blocked a whopping 27 shots, with Ty Emberson and Brett Kulak each recording six. Despite having plenty of shot attempts, the Blue Jackets struggled to get pucks through traffic and finished with only 19 shots on goal.
The final play summed up the night: a badly timed change in overtime coincided with a blocked shot led to Roslovic easily breaking free for a clean breakaway, and he buried it against his former team to end it.
Take this for what it’s worth, but this isn’t the first time the Moneypuck.com “Deserve to Win O’Meter” had the Blue Jackets favored post-game, and they still found a way to lose. In this one, it gave Columbus a 66.3% chance to win in 1,000 game simulations, but the result was all too familiar.
McDavid Takes Over
If there was one thing the Blue Jackets couldn’t afford in this game, it was to let McDavid take over, and that’s exactly what happened. The first star of the game scored two incredible goals that completely dismantled the Blue Jackets’ defense and flipped momentum in the Oilers’ favor.
Edmonton Oilers forward Connor McDavid scores a goal against Columbus Blue Jackets goaltender Jet Greaves (not shown) (Perry Nelson-Imagn Images)
His first came 58 seconds into the third period on an unbelievable spinorama move around Denton Mateychuk before roofing a backhand past Greaves to trim the deficit to one.
His second was just as filthy, as he used his speed to blow past the defense and deke around Greaves to trim the deficit to 4-3.
Mateychuk, who has been solid this season, had arguably his worst game of the season. He was beaten cleanly on McDavid’s first goal and later misplayed a pass from Zach Werenski on the power play that went straight to Walman, who somehow scored the shorthanded goal off a lucky deflection off Mathieu Olivier’s stick.
Mateychuk finished minus-1, while Werenski ended minus-2.
Greaves, however, was solid most of the game and, in my opinion, wasn’t at fault for a few of the goals. He made seven saves in the first period, four of them on grade-A chances, including several against the likes of McDavid and company. He kept the Blue Jackets in it before things unraveled late.
The penalty kill continued its recent solid stretch, going 2-for-2 on the night. But the Blue Jackets again came up short in the key moments. Their tendency to turn over the puck when protecting a lead keeps burning them, and the inability to close out games like this one will cost them down the road.
The Blue Jackets finished with 19 giveaways, far too many against a team with the Oilers’ speed and skill. These are the types of games that add up over a season and ones they will look back on come March. If the Blue Jackets want to stay in the playoff race, they cannot afford to let points like this slip away over and over again.
The Blue Jackets are back in action Tuesday night in Seattle against the Kraken in the second game of a back-to-back. They’ll be tired and are battling through illness, so it will be a real test to see if they can salvage three points from this road trip. Puck drop is at 10:00 PM EST.
