Vincent Desharnais Rewarded For Stellar Play
The Edmonton Oilers defenseman found himself paired with a new defense partner at practice today.
EDMONTON -- The Edmonton Oilers are looking to start another lengthy win streak tomorrow night against the Anaheim Ducks. It will be the first half of a back-to-back for the Oilers. The second half will be played against the Los Angeles Kings on Saturday night.
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The Oilers practiced today at in Coachella Valley, and it revealed some changes to the lineup. Primarily, to the forward group. The middle-six received a shake up with Corey Perry being elevated to the second line and Warren Foegele getting pushed down to the third line.
Of all the players to push down to the third line, putting Fogele there over Evander Kane hardly makes sense. There were more changes however, that raised a few eyebrows.
Kris Knoblauch completely changed up the defense pairings. At practice they had the pairings of Darnell Nurse with Vincent Desharnais, Mattias Ekholm with Cody Ceci and Brett Kulak with Evan Bouchard.
Who knows how long this experiment will last. At first glance, it looks like there could be three pairings here who could share five on five minutes evenly. Then you could still deploy the special teams pairing as they presently are.
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All signs are pointing towards this new configuration being what is deployed on Friday night. If anything, it signals that the coaching staff is ready to give Desharnais more responsibility. He's been a steady rock on the back end for the Oilers. He's relished in the opportunities he's been given, and he has done well for himself.
Provided we see these pairings in action tomorrow night, it will be interesting to see if they last for the duration of the game. From the sounds of things, the coaching staff is not completely sold on having these new pairings for the games this weekend.
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