Hitchcock's culture change paying early dividends for Oilers

EDMONTON -- Connor McDavid has little concern that a focus on flair and offensive firepower appear to be out the window for the Edmonton Oilers under new coach Ken Hitchcock.

"I think we're getting the message how he wants us to play," the Oilers captain said after a 1-0 overtime win against the Dallas Stars at Rogers Place on Tuesday. "It's not pretty hockey. It's a grind, it's defensive but it's effective."
The Oilers are 2-1-1 since Hitchcock replaced Todd McLellan on Nov. 20, and are 11-11-2 with 24 points, three behind the third-place Vegas Golden Knights in the Pacific Division and three points behind the Dallas Stars for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference.
Each of the four games under Hitchcock has been tight, starting with a 4-3 overtime win at the San Jose Sharks the day Hitchcock was hired. The Oilers lost 2-1 in overtime at the Anaheim Ducks on Friday and then lost 5-2 at the Los Angeles Kings on Sunday, a game the Kings led 3-2 with under a minute remaining before scoring two empty-net goals.
"We've been in every game," said McDavid, who has five points (one goal, four assists) in his past four games. "We gave up some points on the road but came home and got two, so it's been effective so far."
McDavid, the NHL scoring leader in each of the past two seasons (108 points last season, 100 in 2016-17), said he'll happily trade high-scoring numbers for victories.
"We're into winning games and if that's how we're going to win games, I'm in for that," he said.
Hitchcock has made the Oilers more persistent and more patient, and he's made no secret that he's been busy trying to adjust their behavior and thinking.
"The one week feels like five years," Hitchcock said Tuesday. "I've coached four games in one week but it feels like 100. I would say the thing I'm proudest of is that to win, you've got to get on the grind in this conference. We got on the grind right away.
"Some days you have energy. We'll have better energy (on Thursday) against Los Angeles (9 p.m. ET; SNW, FS-W, NHL.TV). This was a tough game because of the travel. But I like the fact we're on the grind right now. If we keep having that attitude, we're going to get points from a lot of games."
Edmonton has scored eight goals in four games under Hitchcock; the Oilers scored 57 in 20 games under McLellan.
What priorities have changed?
"Just working, working hard all over the ice, coming back hard, getting in on the forecheck hard," McDavid said. "And that message has been received."
Forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins said that persistence with patience has been the key.
"He's pushing us for sure and making sure we stick with it and don't get frustrated," Nugent-Hopkins said. "It could have been easy for us to start cheating or get frustrated (against Dallas), but we just stuck with it.
"In our division, I think that is how we are going to have to win and we know that. When we went on our playoff run a couple of years ago (2016-17), we were winning all those 3-2, 4-2, 2-1 games. We have to get back to that and understand that is the way that we are going to have success. We're more than OK with that, for sure."
Hitchcock previously coached the Stars, Philadelphia Flyers, Columbus Blue Jackets and St. Louis Blues and won the Stanley Cup with the Dallas in 1999. His bigger challenge with the Oilers will be to get them to sustain their recent play beyond a short sample.

It's something that has plagued Edmonton in the past.
McLellan was 123-119-24 in his three-plus seasons, but the Oilers dipped to 36-40-6 (78 points) last season, sixth in the division and 17 points behind the Colorado Avalanche for the second wild card into the playoffs from the Western Conference.
That up-and-down season followed a 103-point season in 2016-17, when the Oilers finished second in the division and reached the second round, where they lost in seven games to Anaheim.
The signs of inconsistency emerged again this season; Edmonton was 8-2-1 from Oct. 13-Nov. 3, but then went 1-6-0, leading to McLellan's firing.
Hitchcock's to-do list is a long one. Here is where it stands after four games.

Find more consistent commitment to defending

Edmonton had a goal differential of minus-9 (57-66) when Hitchcock took the job and was No. 27 in goals-against per game (3.29). In his first four games, the Oilers have scored eight goals and have allowed 10, two of which were into an empty net.
"I think we're checking better and trying to play a more north-south game, not east-west," defenseman Darnell Nurse said. "He's starting to implement some good, hard-work habits in our game which we need to continue. I think we've adjusted pretty well."

Get the Oilers to play quicker

Hitchcock said he saw a very good sign in this area in the come-from-behind win in San Jose, and the trend has continued in each of the three games since.
"Our play in general, we're definitely more connected and Hitch is being hard on us and our compete level and the way we battle around our net and in the corners," forward Alex Chiasson said.

More from McDavid

McLellan did this some, but Hitchcock intends to double-shift McDavid more with the fourth-line wings, trying to maximize his elite skills and hockey sense. McDavid has 33 points (13 goals, 20 assists) in 24 games. He's played at least 23 minutes (23:57, 23:25, 24:27 and 24:05) in the four games under Hitchcock; he played at least 23 minutes in seven of the first 20 games under McLellan.

Resuscitate the penalty killing

Special teams were a liability for the Oilers last season; they ranked last in the League on the power play and No. 25 on the penalty kill. Their power play had gone up to No. 15 (20.6 percent) before Hitchcock took over, but the penalty killing was No. 27 (74.2 percent). Under Hitchcock, the Oilers have held opponents off the scoreboard on the power play in three of the four games he's coached and have killed 10 of 12 opportunities.

Solve the dilemma with Milan Lucic

Lucic scored one goal in the final 46 games of last season and has one goal in the first 24 games of this season.
Hitchcock put Lucic on a line with Zack Kassian (one goal in 21 games) and center Kyle Brodziak, dubbing them the "Identity Line," and asking them to set a work standard for the team. The line has not scored since being put together but has played with an edge.