Before the Canada vs. USA World Junior Hockey Championship gold medal game and the Edmonton Oilers vs Phoenix Coyotes NHL games were even started I was already thinking about how this article would look. It had the premise of Canada wins gold for a 6th straight year and the Oilers sucked as usual.

Then when the games started I had to start reconsidering what I was thinking. After the first period with the game tied at 2 it was still going to be Canada winning gold but I was very impressed by the USA team speed and determination and was going to have to add that in somewhere. Over in the other game the Oilers were doing what I expected at this time; losing 1-0.

1 minute into the second period the USA scored to go up 3-2. Just less than 3 minutes later Canada tied it up for the second time. It was at this point that the USA won the gold medal in my opinion. They pulled their starting goalie, Mike Lee, and replaced him with Jack Campbell. That change seemed to buoy the American team and until the last 3 minutes of the third period, Campbell stoned the Canadians at every chance they had. On the other side, Canadian starter Jake Allen was equally as shaky as Lee and finally was replaced after the 5th USA goal at 6:23 of the third period by Martin Jones. With under 14 minutes to go in a gold medal game was too late to be making that change. Canadian Coach Willie Desjardins threw a cold Jones to the wolves so to speak and I think Jones was at least partially at fault on the OT winner by the USA’s John Carlson. Goalies in any sport are coached with the understanding that nothing beats you short side. You have to at least have that covered. The winning goal went short side. I give a hat tip to USA coach Dean Blais for making the change he did when he did. Congratulations to team USA for a great tournament. We look forward to beating you next year when the tournament is on your home soil.

The reasons were different but the result was the same. The Oilers finished the 2009 portion of their season losing to Calgary 2-1 in a game that could have been much worse had it not been for Jeff Deslauriers’ great job goaltending. His 37 saves was the reason it was only 1 goal loss. The rest of the Oilers decided to start their New Year’s celebration early and never showed up to test the Flames back-up goaltender Curtis McElhinney. 22 shots is hardly the kind of work needed to test a second string goalie who plays so infrequently that he has slivers on his butt from riding the pine.

Saturday night the Oilers started the 2010 portion of their schedule with a 4-1 loss to the Sharks in San Jose. Same result, one big difference. Again, the Oilers offence didn’t create the kind of chances that win many games but today they didn’t have the goaltending to give them any chance to win. While he stood on his head to make the saves against Calgary, Deslauriers appeared to be sleeping through portions of the game and 3 of the 4 goals should have been saved. Yes, as usual there were defensive breakdowns but fluff shots should not go in no matter who is in goal. Critical saves need to be made at critical times in order to give your team and chance to win and this happens to infrequently.