Where the Oilers power play goals came from in 2013
The Edmonton Oilers power play was ranked 8th best in the NHL in 2013, cashing in on power plays at a rate of 20.1 per cent.
Not bad at all.
Nonetheless, it wasn’t hard to imagine that same power play doing somewhat better, and perhaps challenging for the league lead, given the talent that Edmonton could put out, starting with Taylor Hall, Nail Yakupov, Jordan Eberle, Sam Gagner, Justin Schultz, Ales Hemsky, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins.
For that to happen, the unit needs to generate both more shots and more high quality shots, setting up primary weapons like Yakupov, Hall and Gagner in their best shooting positions.
Before we speculate on how the Oilers power play might improve (we’ll do that in our next post), let’s just look at where the 34 goals and 34 primary assists came from on the existing power play in 2013.
When it came to setting up goals — to the location of where primary assists came from on the Oilers power play — we see that Ryan Nugent-Hopkins had some success from his customary spot on the right (facing the goalie) half-wall. Six times he got the puck there and whipped it into the crease area where Shawn Horcoff. Sam Gagner or Taylor Hall shot, jammed and deflected it in. On one play, he passed it to back up top, finding Justin Schultz, who snapped the puck in for a goal.
When it came to scoring from that same place, Nugent-Hopkins had much less luck and success, perhaps because he had a bad shoulder, maybe because he simply needs to work on his shot. He scored just one goal from the right faceoff circle in 2013, and that was actually the first time he had scored from that half-wall ever on the Oilers power play. It’s a high yield area for RNH when it comes to passing then, but not when it comes to shooting.
When it came to other players setting up power play goals with primary assists, we see Hall did it seven times from all over the attack zone, while Gagner had six such primary assists, most of them coming from his office on the left side.
So a power play with RNH somewhere on the right and Gagner somewhere on the left seems like a good place to start building the top Oilers unit.
Now let’s look at where the goals came from.
Good idea getting the puck down low into the crease, isn’t it? Good idea to have folks crowding around down there, too.
Justin Schultz fired in four power play goals from longer range, Sam Gagner had a couple longer bombs, and Nail Yakupov had three as well. Again it looks like a fine idea to have Gagner operating on that left side, while Yakupov looks like a right sided ace. Hall got some goals around the crease on the right side, while Hemsky and Eberle scored from the left side, right in front of the net.
The Oilers have a strong array of left-handed shooters in Hall, Yakupov and RNH, and a strong array of right-handed shooters in Schultz, Eberle and Gagner (with Hemsky likely to be traded).
In our next post, we’ll dig into where they all might possibly be stationed to get the most out of this group.
Other posts
First impressions of potential Oilers free agent target Paul Ranger
Must-read story about the life and coaching career of Dallas Eakins
Corey Potter had a decent season. Really. He did.
