<p>After securing an <a href="https://publish.oilersnation.com/2024/10/27/leon-draisaitls-three-point-night-powers-edmonton-oilers-3-2-comeback-win-over-detroit-red-wings/">overtime victory yesterday in Detroit</a>, the Edmonton Oilers were back at work and looking for their first win in Columbus since October 2019. Unfortunately, <a href="https://oilersnation.com/news/instant-reaction-disaster-in-columbus-as-oilers-get-hammered-by-blue-jackets">the 6-1 final score</a> became secondary very early on when news broke that Connor McDavid would not return to the game after suffering a lower-body injury on his first shift of the night.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s incredible how quickly a person can go from being excited about the hockey game to not caring at all about the result, but that&#8217;s precisely what happened for many Oilers fans when news broke that <a href="https://publish.oilersnation.com/2024/10/28/edmonton-oilers-captain-connor-mcdavid-leaves-monday-game-with-lower-body-injury-after-first-shift/">Connor McDavid would not return to the game</a>. After getting tripped and crashing into the boards on his first shift of the game, McDavid appeared to be okay when he first got up, but that changed quickly when he tried to take a few strides.</p>
<p>Even as three goals on six shots were being pumped into the Oilers&#8217; net, all everyone seemed to care about was what was happening with our captain and when we would hear details about what happened. The last time I remember a result being so secondary to what else was happening on the ice was back in McDavid&#8217;s rookie season when Brandon Manning hauled him down on the rush and broke his collarbone.</p>
<p>Turning back to the game itself, I wonder if the players were just as rattled as the fanbase because they did not look very good or engaged. If you were making a treasure hunt of everything that could go wrong in a game, the Oilers seemed especially interested in collecting the whole set. Outside of generating more shots on goal than Columbus did, nothing went right for Edmonton. No matter what Kris Knoblauch tried to get the train back on the rails, everything was off by a half turn. How else would you describe this disaster?</p>
<p>In the span of just over 24 hours, the Oilers went from being a team on the rise that just won its second straight game to get back to .500 to one that was without its captain and couldn&#8217;t stop a shot to save their lives. As much as there&#8217;s the &#8220;next man up&#8221; cliche that gets batted around when injuries arise, it&#8217;s impossible to fill Connor McDavid&#8217;s shoes, and the team played like they knew it to be true. I know they&#8217;re professionals and all, but the boys looked rattled.</p>
<p>I don&#8217;t want to blame McDavid getting hurt for everything that went wrong — that was not the case — but it&#8217;s hard to ignore how shaky everyone was for the final 55+ minutes. Even when the boys looked like they might string a few shifts together, they&#8217;d either stumble over themselves, hit the post, or find some other creative way of screwing things up. It was one of those nights where nothing was going right, and everything was going wrong.</p>
<p>As much as I want to be mad about how things went, the only way to look at a game like that is to hope Connor McDavid&#8217;s injury won&#8217;t be too bad and literally forget the rest. It&#8217;s the only thing you can do with that. There were no silver linings and no positives to draw upon, but rather a forgettable night that had me feeling bad for the smattering of Oilers fans that who their hard earned money to sit there among the Blue Jackets fans.</p>
<p>No matter how you slice it, that game against the Blue Jackets was about as bad as it gets. Flush it and move on, boys.</p>
<h1>OTHER THINGS WORTH MENTIONING&#8230;</h1>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">
<p lang="en" dir="ltr">Early word out of Columbus is that it’s nothing too serious with McDavid at this point.</p>
<p>&mdash; Ryan Rishaug (@TSNRyanRishaug) <a href="https://twitter.com/TSNRyanRishaug/status/1851058149580816424?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2024</a></p></blockquote>
<p><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script></p>
<ul>
<li>Connor McDavid left the game after getting tripped on his first shift of the night and did not return after what is being described as a lower-body injury. As far as bad news goes, the start of this hockey game couldn&#8217;t have gone worse for the Oilers if they tried.</li>
<li>Sean Monahan opened the scoring (1-0) early in the first period with a power play goal that came on a perfectly executed shot-pass deflection in the slot. Viktor Arvidsson took a tough penalty at the other end of the rink, and the Blue Jackets wasted no time making them pay for it. By the time Sean Monahan scored off the backboards (6-0) I had pretty much stopped paying attention, and I can&#8217;t imagine I&#8217;m the only one.</li>
<li>Adam Fantili extended Columbus&#8217; lead (2-0) on a horrible goal from the slot that beat Skinner low on the blocker side. Maybe I&#8217;m being harsh, but Stu has to stop that shot every single time. Yikes.</li>
<li>Cody Sillinger put the Blue Jackets up by a field goal (3-0) with a long-distance shot from the point that made its way through a few bodies before beating Skinner up high. It was the third Columbus goal on only their sixth shot, if you were wondering how the first period was going.</li>
<li>Mathieu Olivier threw a handful of salt in the Oilers&#8217; festering wound with Columbus&#8217; fourth goal (4-0) that game as a result of a scrambled play near the crease that the visitors simply could not clear.</li>
<li>Given how the even went as a whole, were you surprised to hear that Mikael Pyyhtia scored his first NHL goal (5-0) to nail the coffin shut? Nah, I didn&#8217;t think so either.</li>
<li>Mattias Ekholm scored a power play goal with just under 27 seconds left (6-1) with a seeing-eye wrister from the point that didn&#8217;t matter in the grand scheme of things, but did break up the shutout bid.</li>
<li>For as good as Stuart Skinner was <a href="https://publish.oilersnation.com/2024/10/26/oilers-dominate-the-penguins-to-a-4-0-finish-and-it-could-have-been-so-much-worse-than-that/">on Friday night against the Penguins</a>, he was as equally poor against the Blue Jackets. I don&#8217;t want to pile on the guy more than everybody already will, but it&#8217;s hard not to feel bummed out when you see your start allow six goals on only 25 shots. That works out to a .760 save%, in case you were wondering.</li>
<li>The penalty kill continues to stick out like a sore thumb after giving up one goal on four shorthanded situations. Amazingly, going 75% on the night will actually increase Edmonton&#8217;s abysmal PK totals.</li>
<li>Not to be outdone, the Oilers&#8217; power play was especially bad on Monday. The PP was struggling with Connor McDavid on the PP1 unit, so you can only imagine how bad things got without him. Yeah, they scored one to wrap up the night, but it really didn&#8217;t matter at that point. I wish I had some answer for what is going on here, but the power play struggles are something that I did not have on my bingo card.</li>
<li>The Oilers won 61.8% of the faceoffs and I can&#8217;t even care about it. You see what this team does to me?</li>
</ul>
<h2><strong>Presented by Amazon Prime Video</strong></h2>
<p><a href="https://primevideo-row.pxf.io/c/5560083/2159842/20020"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-full wp-image-162341 aligncenter" src="http://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/PRIMN_24_HED_727x404_POST_Final_en-CA_GSS00011213-1.jpg" alt="" width="795" height="404" srcset="https://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/PRIMN_24_HED_727x404_POST_Final_en-CA_GSS00011213-1.jpg 795w, https://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/PRIMN_24_HED_727x404_POST_Final_en-CA_GSS00011213-1-300x152.jpg 300w, https://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/PRIMN_24_HED_727x404_POST_Final_en-CA_GSS00011213-1-768x390.jpg 768w" sizes="(max-width: 795px) 100vw, 795px" /></a></p>
<p>This Article is a Presentation of Prime Video. Catch Prime Monday Night Hockey, all season long. <a href="https://primevideo-row.pxf.io/c/5560083/2159842/20020" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Claim your free trial today</a>.</p>


After securing an <a href="https://publish.oilersnation.com/2024/10/27/leon-draisaitls-three-point-night-powers-edmonton-oilers-3-2-comeback-win-over-detroit-red-wings/">overtime victory yesterday in Detroit</a>, the Edmonton Oilers were back at work and looking for their first win in Columbus since October 2019. Unfortunately, <a href="https://oilersnation.com/news/instant-reaction-disaster-in-columbus-as-oilers-get-hammered-by-blue-jackets">the 6-1 final score</a> became secondary very early on when news broke that Connor McDavid would not return to the game after suffering a lower-body injury on his first shift of the night.

It's incredible how quickly a person can go from being excited about the hockey game to not caring at all about the result, but that's precisely what happened for many Oilers fans when news broke that <a href="https://publish.oilersnation.com/2024/10/28/edmonton-oilers-captain-connor-mcdavid-leaves-monday-game-with-lower-body-injury-after-first-shift/">Connor McDavid would not return to the game</a>. After getting tripped and crashing into the boards on his first shift of the game, McDavid appeared to be okay when he first got up, but that changed quickly when he tried to take a few strides.

Even as three goals on six shots were being pumped into the Oilers' net, all everyone seemed to care about was what was happening with our captain and when we would hear details about what happened. The last time I remember a result being so secondary to what else was happening on the ice was back in McDavid's rookie season when Brandon Manning hauled him down on the rush and broke his collarbone.

Turning back to the game itself, I wonder if the players were just as rattled as the fanbase because they did not look very good or engaged. If you were making a treasure hunt of everything that could go wrong in a game, the Oilers seemed especially interested in collecting the whole set. Outside of generating more shots on goal than Columbus did, nothing went right for Edmonton. No matter what Kris Knoblauch tried to get the train back on the rails, everything was off by a half turn. How else would you describe this disaster?

In the span of just over 24 hours, the Oilers went from being a team on the rise that just won its second straight game to get back to .500 to one that was without its captain and couldn't stop a shot to save their lives. As much as there's the "next man up" cliche that gets batted around when injuries arise, it's impossible to fill Connor McDavid's shoes, and the team played like they knew it to be true. I know they're professionals and all, but the boys looked rattled.

I don't want to blame McDavid getting hurt for everything that went wrong — that was not the case — but it's hard to ignore how shaky everyone was for the final 55+ minutes. Even when the boys looked like they might string a few shifts together, they'd either stumble over themselves, hit the post, or find some other creative way of screwing things up. It was one of those nights where nothing was going right, and everything was going wrong.

As much as I want to be mad about how things went, the only way to look at a game like that is to hope Connor McDavid's injury won't be too bad and literally forget the rest. It's the only thing you can do with that. There were no silver linings and no positives to draw upon, but rather a forgettable night that had me feeling bad for the smattering of Oilers fans that who their hard earned money to sit there among the Blue Jackets fans.

No matter how you slice it, that game against the Blue Jackets was about as bad as it gets. Flush it and move on, boys.
<h1>OTHER THINGS WORTH MENTIONING...</h1>
https://twitter.com/TSNRyanRishaug/status/1851058149580816424
<ul>
 	<li>Connor McDavid left the game after getting tripped on his first shift of the night and did not return after what is being described as a lower-body injury. As far as bad news goes, the start of this hockey game couldn't have gone worse for the Oilers if they tried.</li>
 	<li>Sean Monahan opened the scoring (1-0) early in the first period with a power play goal that came on a perfectly executed shot-pass deflection in the slot. Viktor Arvidsson took a tough penalty at the other end of the rink, and the Blue Jackets wasted no time making them pay for it. By the time Sean Monahan scored off the backboards (6-0) I had pretty much stopped paying attention, and I can't imagine I'm the only one.</li>
 	<li>Adam Fantili extended Columbus' lead (2-0) on a horrible goal from the slot that beat Skinner low on the blocker side. Maybe I'm being harsh, but Stu has to stop that shot every single time. Yikes.</li>
 	<li>Cody Sillinger put the Blue Jackets up by a field goal (3-0) with a long-distance shot from the point that made its way through a few bodies before beating Skinner up high. It was the third Columbus goal on only their sixth shot, if you were wondering how the first period was going.</li>
 	<li>Mathieu Olivier threw a handful of salt in the Oilers' festering wound with Columbus' fourth goal (4-0) that game as a result of a scrambled play near the crease that the visitors simply could not clear.</li>
 	<li>Given how the even went as a whole, were you surprised to hear that Mikael Pyyhtia scored his first NHL goal (5-0) to nail the coffin shut? Nah, I didn't think so either.</li>
 	<li>Mattias Ekholm scored a power play goal with just under 27 seconds left (6-1) with a seeing-eye wrister from the point that didn't matter in the grand scheme of things, but did break up the shutout bid.</li>
 	<li>For as good as Stuart Skinner was <a href="https://publish.oilersnation.com/2024/10/26/oilers-dominate-the-penguins-to-a-4-0-finish-and-it-could-have-been-so-much-worse-than-that/">on Friday night against the Penguins</a>, he was as equally poor against the Blue Jackets. I don't want to pile on the guy more than everybody already will, but it's hard not to feel bummed out when you see your start allow six goals on only 25 shots. That works out to a .760 save%, in case you were wondering.</li>
 	<li>The penalty kill continues to stick out like a sore thumb after giving up one goal on four shorthanded situations. Amazingly, going 75% on the night will actually increase Edmonton's abysmal PK totals.</li>
 	<li>Not to be outdone, the Oilers' power play was especially bad on Monday. The PP was struggling with Connor McDavid on the PP1 unit, so you can only imagine how bad things got without him. Yeah, they scored one to wrap up the night, but it really didn't matter at that point. I wish I had some answer for what is going on here, but the power play struggles are something that I did not have on my bingo card.</li>
 	<li>The Oilers won 61.8% of the faceoffs and I can't even care about it. You see what this team does to me?</li>
</ul>
<h2><strong>Presented by Amazon Prime Video</strong></h2>
<a href="https://primevideo-row.pxf.io/c/5560083/2159842/20020"><img class="size-full wp-image-162341 aligncenter" src="http://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/PRIMN_24_HED_727x404_POST_Final_en-CA_GSS00011213-1.jpg" alt="" width="795" height="404" /></a>

This Article is a Presentation of Prime Video. Catch Prime Monday Night Hockey, all season long. <a href="https://primevideo-row.pxf.io/c/5560083/2159842/20020" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Claim your free trial today</a>.

Oilers fall 6-1 to the Blue Jackets, but all anyone cared about was what happened to Connor McDavid

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