Did the Oilers make the right adjustments for Game 4?

The Edmonton Oilers are set to make changes heading into Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final on Thursday night against the Florida Panthers. 

After falling 6-1 in Game 3, head coach Chris Knoblauch announced that left-winger Jeff Skinner and defenseman Troy Stetcher would draw into the lineup for Viktor Arvidsson and John Klingberg, while Stuart Skinner would also get the start in goal. 

Stetcher has played six games through the playoffs so far, and has spent ample time with Darnell Nurse on the blueline, while Skinner has a goal and an assist in two games this postseason. 

On Thursday’s episode of Daily Faceoff Live, Tyler Yaremchuk and Frank Seravalli dove into whether the adjustments will be the right ones for the Oilers. 

Yaremchuk: Jeff Skinner is going to draw into the Oilers lineup for Viktor Arvidsson up front, and on the blue line, it’s Troy Stetcher for John Klingberg, as we speculated on yesterday’s show. 

I love the adjustment on the blue line. These pairings have shown that they work. Nurse and Stecher were together for basically two rounds of the playoffs, and they were excellent. Brett Kulak and Evan Bouchard were together for basically the whole playoffs, and they were very good. Now, you can ease the minutes on Mathias Ekholm a bit, put him on your third pair. I like all these adjustments from Knoblauch. 

Seravalli: I couldn’t agree more. I’m really nonplussed on the Skinner thing. I’m not saying Arvidsson has been good; I just don’t know what Skinner brings to your lineup that makes you want to put him in.  

But, the pairings are a great point. Stetcher has proven that he can be the Darnell Nurse whisperer, which, if you can solve that issue for your team, that’s a huge leg up. Kulak, since going back and when Ekholm drew back into the lineup, has just been okay. If you can get Kulak back to playoff Brett Kulak, that’s a huge bonus as well. 

I just think these were the uncomfortable changes to make, because Klingberg really did play well for a stretch of time, but he hasn’t given you much in this Stanley Cup final, and no doubt that Ekholm kind of threw things out of whack, which is a weird thing to say when you’re getting maybe your number two defenseman back, that it changed things up for you and I think that is the reality.

You can catch the rest of Thursday’s episode and the Stanley Cup preview content here…