Late in the second period, in full view of the Hockey Night in Canada cameras, Perry lambasted Kane in an extended rant that looked like a cross between Bobby Knight and John Tortorella
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Well, that was a compelling bit of theatre on the Edmonton Oilers bench Saturday night in Calgary, wasn’t it?
A routine and predictable win over the lowly Flames keeps the Oilers alive in the chase for first place in the Pacific Division and, on the heels of a 6-2 win over Colorado the night before, demonstrates a healthy resilience after a punishing loss in Dallas.
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Leon Draisaitl scored his 40th goal, Connor McDavid moved one assist away from 100, the fourth line had a big night and Calvin Pickard continued to prove he belongs in the NHL.
It was a good night on a lot of fronts, but the spotlight in the wake of this game fell on Corey Perry tearing into linemate Evander Kane on the Oilers bench.
Late in the second period, in full view of the Hockey Night in Canada cameras, Perry lambasted Kane in an extended rant that looked like a cross between Bobby Knight and John Tortorella. It appeared as though Perry was scolding Kane over a needless giveaway in the Calgary end.
With Edmonton’s effective third line (three goals the game before) working the puck down low, Kane sent a soft pass to nobody in particular. The cycle was dead and the Flames were racing into Edmonton’s end.
Not great, but not the end of the world and certainly nothing worse than we’ve seen from other players lately.
But Perry, for some reason, erupted. Slamming, gesturing, screaming and making no attempt to be discrete about his anger.
It was a stunner, something you don’t see a very often, especially in hockey. And, according to Perry former teammate and NHL analyst Kevin Bieksa, it’s something you never see out of Perry. So if he felt the need to come off the top ropes on live television there must be something important that he wants to see addressed.
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That’s the good part. The Oilers have a lot of stuff that needs to be cleaned out of their game. Silly giveaways like the ones that got them buried in Dallas. Retaliatory penalties like the one Kane took in the second period that cost Edmonton a goal and the one Draisaitl took late in the third period with a 3-2 lead.
It’s good that somebody is stepping up and firing back at the kind of stuff that gets you eliminated from a series. Perry has been around more than anyone on the team and knows that you have to clean these things up if you’re serious about winning a championship.
And the fact he lost his mind on a pretty simple and relatively harmless turnover suggests there might be more to the issue than just that one play. Who knows?
If something needed to be said, it’s good that Perry said it, but it should have been done behind closed doors.
That’s the bad part.
Airing dirty laundry in public like that is never good. It creates drama, and nobody likes drama. Not when they team is trying ready itself for the most important post season in about 35 years.
Now every interaction between Kane and Perry, or Kane an any other teammate, will be micro-analyzed. The background noise will no be wondering if there is dissension in the room or if Kane is wearing out his welcome in Edmonton. People will be writing 850-word columns on it the next morning.
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A lot of topics and distractions that the Oilers don’t need to be dealing with at this point in the season are going to be on the table.
And, make no mistake, the Oilers dodged a bullet Saturday night.
That’s the potentially ugly part.
The last thing any team needs is full on infighting in the middle of a game on national television and it came perilously close to happening. If Kane decides to fire back at Perry with the same kind of vigour and aggression that Perry displayed and you’ve got two veterans screaming at each other we’d be dealing with a much bigger situation than whatever Knoblauch and the coaching staff are ironing out now.
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At the end of the day, this might be nothing. Getting frustrations out like that is often good for a room — it clears the air and leads to the kind of hard, honest discussions a team with championship aspirations needs to have.
As for the chatter and distractions that might come from this, players are experts at shutting those out, especially in Edmonton, and this should be no different.
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Asked after the game about the Perry-Kane spat, Knoblauch says it’s over, everyone is cool and there are no smouldering issues left to be dealt with.
“I know before the period started they talked and worked it out,” he said. “There was a disagreement. Two passionate players and nothing more than that.
“That most important thing is do they stay focused, able to return from that exchange and being ready for their next shift. If they have that exchange and it affects others on the bench or their next shift, we don’t want to see that.
“But these players are very competitive, they have emotions and sometimes it comes out. I don’t want to assume it’s going to happen again.”
E-mail: rtychkowski@postmedia.com
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