The Oilers are playing a man short in 11-7 if they don\u2019t give Alec Regula shifts<\/p>\n
There are just 11 forwards at Edmonton Oilers<\/a>\u2019 head coach Kris Knoblauch\u2019s disposal, but there are 18 available bodies.\u00a0Running 11 forwards and seven defencemen on Tuesday night against the New Jersey Devils got the Oilers into a bind. Vasily Podkolzin missed 17 minutes due to \u201cinstigating\u201d and misconduct for jumping to Connor McDavid\u2019s defence<\/a>, meaning that for most of the second period, Edmonton had just 10 forwards to play with.\u00a0There\u2019s no replacing Leon Draisaitl when he\u2019s gone<\/a>, and Kasperi Kapanen quickly moulded into top-six form before he went down. Their absences were especially noticeable in the second period, and despite a dominating third period, they lost 2-1<\/a>.<\/p>\n Looking at the ice-times after the game, seventh defenceman Alec Regula played a whole two minutes and 35 seconds on the night.\u00a0<\/p>\n So really, the Oilers were playing 11-6, and for a third of the game were playing 10-6.\u00a0<\/p>\n At this important juncture of the season, can the Oilers afford to play undermanned for any longer?\u00a0<\/p>\n Regula at forward? <\/p>\n At practice on Wednesday morning, Alec Regula skated as a forward with Trent Frederic and Vasily Podkolzin.\u00a0<\/p>\n Jason Gregor pointed out<\/a> that he\u2019s acting as a \u201cplaceholder\u201d in that forward spot, but after watching a very winnable game slip between the Oilers fingers, Knoblauch needs to be creative.\u00a0There doesn\u2019t seem to be any appetite to help the forward situation by deciding on Calvin Pickard<\/a>, which would solve this issue. The Oilers can\u2019t call up a forward unless they waive Pickard.\u00a0<\/p>\n Situations like last night\u2019s game illustrate why it can be costly. It doesn\u2019t take much during the game \u2013 whether it be injury or penalties \u2013 and you\u2019re playing severely undermanned, especially when the seventh defenceman isn\u2019t taking a shift.\u00a0<\/p>\n Oilers practice lines… D pairs the same. Is skating Regula on a wing for a couple of minutes that bad?\u00a0<\/p>\n I don\u2019t think so.\u00a0<\/p>\n He\u2019s played 51 NHL games, granted, and there\u2019s been growing pains this season. He\u2019s the seventh defenceman for a reason at the moment and under ideal circumstances, would fill into the lineup occasionally.\u00a0<\/p>\n But when you\u2019re playing with a short deck, you have to play the cards you have in your hand.\u00a0Spreading the load every so much with a couple more minutes can help.\u00a0<\/p>\n Former Oilers coach Jay Woodcroft loved using 11-7. Knoblauch doesn\u2019t strike me as someone who likes that structure nearly as much, finding perhaps the seventh defenceman a nuisance.<\/p>\n Leon Draisaitl is expected back \u201clater this week,\u201d likely Saturday, and Kasperi Kapanen likely won\u2019t miss more than two more games. Provided there are no more forward injuries, then Knoblauch will have a complement of 13 forwards again.\u00a0<\/p>\n Since you\u2019re being forced into it, why not skate Regula at wing for a few shifts, especially if he\u2019s not getting anywhere near a regular shift on the blu eline. The Oilers need to grit their teeth through this all-hands-on-deck scenario.\u00a0<\/p>\n It seems a better strategy than having him rot on the bench for the entire game.<\/p>\n Michael Menzies is an Oilersnation columnist and has been the play-by-play voice of the Bonnyville Pontiacs in the AJHL since 2019. With seven years news experience as the Editor-at-Large of Lakeland Connect in Bonnyville, he also collects vinyl, books, and stomach issues.<\/p>\n ARTICLE PRESENTED BY bet365<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Oilers are playing a man short in 11-7 if they don\u2019t give Alec Regula shifts There are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":424944,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":["post-424943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=424943"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424943\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/424944"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=424943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=424943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=424943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nRNH-McDavid-Hyman
\nHoward-Roslovic-Savoie
\nJanmark-Lazar-Mangiapane
\nPodkolzin-Frederic-Regula (playing Fwd)<\/p>\n
\nIngram and Jarry each in their respective starter net, as Jarry likes the visiting net.<\/p>\n