Today we have a little fun with the column to a point. Mike Mouat of the Detroit Red Wings Examiner and I have gone back and forth this season trying to figure out if the Red Wings need to score like the 1985 Oilers to win games. Well I am going to attempt and try to take this to the next level. Naturally we pulled a fast one and realized the 1983-84 Oilers scored a whopping 446 goals. They did allow 314 by the way.
Thanks to hockeydb.com….let’s take a snapshot at those golden Oiler years.
| 1981-82 | Edmonton Oilers | 80 | 48 | 17 | 15 | 0 | 0.694 | 417 | 295 | Lost in round 1 | ||||||
| 1982-83 | Edmonton Oilers | 80 | 47 | 21 | 12 | 0 | 0.663 | 424 | 315 | Lost in Finals | ||||||
| 1983-84 | Edmonton Oilers | 80 | 57 | 18 | 5 | 0 | 0.744 | 446 | 314 | Won Cup | ||||||
| 1984-85 | Edmonton Oilers | 80 | 49 | 20 | 11 | 0 | 0.681 | 401 | 298 | Won Cup | ||||||
| 1985-86 | Edmonton Oilers | 80 | 56 | 17 | 7 | 0 | 0.744 | 426 | 310 | Lost in round 2 |
Highlighted in bold are the years where the Oilers scored more than 400 goals. They did it five straight years which is unheard of. Now obviously the Red Wings do not have the likes of Messier, Kurri, Gretzky, and company. However, it may feel like they have to score just as often to compensate for what has been horrific penalty killing and goaltending. Chris Osgood and Jimmy Howard have been more porous than a wet sponge this season.
This fact is so true that the Red Wings have now twice in the last two games overcome three goal deficits in the third period on the road. Now this is extremely rare as the last time I have seen it happen with my own eyes on the road is the 94-95 season with New Jersey. Yes I know there has been 1 or 2 occurrences similar. That being said why is it taking so long in games for the Red Wings to get going?
The Oilers early in that 81-82 season were kind of the same way and then caught fire. Somehow I do not think the Red Wings can keep on scoring 3 or 4 goals every third period with 20+ shots on goal. Some will argue that Luongo was injured and that Khabibulin may have been tired…but that took some effort from the Wings last night and does show the potential and pride of this team if Mike Babcock can ever get some halfway decent goaltending. Bad goaltending plays havoc with your penalty kill….right Toronto?? Yes I thought so.
In that 83-84 season…the Oilers had 8 different guys score 20 and 3 different guys score 50 including 87 by a certain #99. It was a machine of a team that played in a different era. You will not see a 200 point in this NHL for example but shots and scoring chances are definitely up this year and goals are up as well. It is why you see the short bursts of absolutely crazy scoring. However, no team has the talent to really keep up like this except for maybe the Washington Capitals and even they are having some struggles offensively (not Ovechkin obviously).
To be fair, let’s show the boxscores from the last two detroit games HERE and HERE. So in the last two games…the Red Wings have fired 34 shots on net in the third period and scored 7 times. That is better than a 20% shooting percentage which is something almost unheard of in today’s NHL. These are statistical anomalies that often balance themselves out. The injury to Val Filppula not withstanding, the Wings will have a harder time patching that hole than most think.
The question is what is it going to take for the Red Wings to win consistently? The answer is really simple. Score about 4 goals a night and they should make the playoffs. That is my take on it. What do you think? Can the Wings find a way to motivate Osgood or Howard or do they have to eventually just look elsewhere at the deadline?
