Jan. 17, 2013 - Issue #900: The ongoing musical evolution of Hannah Georgas

In the Box

No argument here

(Since we last left our columnists, Brent asked the world to provide a collective circle-jerk of projections for the upcoming Oilers' season. This week, co-columnist Craig Douglas weighs in.)

Craig Douglas: Allow me to introduce myself. I'm Craig and I'm here after sitting out the season's inaugural article. I'm a long-time hockey fan (if 30-some years is a long time) and I'm also all those things Brent mentioned in the previous column and some other unmentionable things. I'm excited to be writing about the local squad and the NHL in general and I'm double-super excited to attend the home opener for this annoyingly-shortened season. My complaints are many, but I've been complaining about them all winter, so I'm going to cram them and keep this positive—except for the other things I'll surely complain about. Make sense?

Complaint #1: I ordered NHL Center Ice this afternoon and it cost MONEY! Maybe not a lot of money, but money nonetheless! ($50) That's only a buck a game and a buck per team to watch as much shitty hockey as I want. However, after a lockout's worth of rumours about it maybe being free (to be a mediocre "apology"), I was dismayed to see that a bunch of greedy people were still being greedy.

Complaint #2: The PS3 app that allows you to watch GameCenter on your Playstation is not ready yet, because, well ... of course it's not ready yet. So I watched a hockey game on an iPad for the first time on Tuesday, and in the interest of saying something positive, it was actually OK.

But enough about me, how about those Oilers?

Brent Oliver: The Oilers season is off a day later than the other 28 teams in the league, but hey, I'm pretty sure it was worth the wait.

As Craig and I write this, the Oilers and your trusty ITB columnists are basking in the glory of not only a come-from-behind victory, but a come-from-behind victory against the two-time Presidents' Trophy-winning Vancouver Canucks—and in their home-barn for chrissakes! Regardless of the ridiculous fan and pundit-induced goalie controversy in Vancouver, they're still a great team (as much as I hate every fibre of their stupid being. Asshats.). We have yet to see the home opener Tuesday against the Sharks, where we're all hoping this train of Tits and Heineken continues to roll into Rexall Place and we don't get our asses handed to us by a team from northern California.

CD: My thoughts regarding Sunday's game number 34 (or game number one as we've been forced to call it) and with the start of this so-called season in general: it sure was nice to see hockey again. I caught an occasional glimpse of the NHL games on Saturday, but Sunday's game was my first chance to sit down and attempt to not hate hockey and I suppose I took to it well enough.  The Oil didn't let us down either, playing their hearts out and besting lousy Vancouver. Seeing Eberle go around Edler with 3.1 seconds left in the second period to make it close and interesting, had me hooked again. Beating the Canucks in the season opener may well come in handy when May rolls around and the glorious playoffs actually begin. The refs, who definitely didn't get to practice in Europe, haven't looked great, but that is not exactly an original complaint.

BO: I really have to hand it to the Oilers: for all the usual crap, they didn't quit after they were down two goals, they skated and defended well against a very good team, but more than anything, holy shit, THE OILERS LOOK LIKE A REAL NHL HOCKEY TEAM. Pardon me when I remind everyone that we haven't actually seen a professional team from this city play like one in years! (Yes, I know the Oil Kings are WHL champs, but that doesn't count, so save your letters and tweets to @inthebox). I think Ralph Krueger coached a masterful game, playing into the Canucks' exhaustion from a game the night before. The Oilers came like a house-on-fire in the late second and third periods and, if that wasn't enough, Coach Copernicus (Colin Kaepernick) makes the boys shut down the CanSchmucks in OT to force the shootout, where the Oilers had their best chance of winning the extra point. Think I'm wrong? The Oilers kids have been practicing shootouts for months in the AHL while Cory Schneider was playing 12 games in Switzerland and Luongo was waiting to be traded (as usual). Brilliant coaching from King Ralph, but let's talk in a few games.

CD: The Oilers actually looked OK to me too: Dubnyk (whose hot new mask I actually quite like) made some great saves (or "dynamic" as Debrusk calls 'em). The Canuck known as Kassian was just starting to annoy me and then Eager punched him in the head a bunch. And to echo Brent, the Oil really do look like a real NHL hockey team, complete with wins and everything! It's too early to proclaim anything other than that it seems as though hockey may be back and we all might as well at least enjoy that fact a little. So on that note (and not to get all Willem Dafoe on y'all) I'm going to recommend this movie, and by movie I mean this lousy, aborted season of hockey.

BO: Looking ahead, I'm pretty pumped for this week's slate of games at home and here's hoping they don't get shellacked on the home opener so Craig and I don't look like morons. (Speaking of which, really, Jim Matheson? You want to point out that Yakupov was -2 in his debut when his linemate Gagner was clearly shittier than the guy who has exactly six minutes of NHL service? Come on.)

This week's games include the Stanley Cup Champs on Thursday and the not so mighty (but mighty OLD) Calgary Flames on Saturday. I think the Kings may bounce back from a shitty home opener and beat the Oil, but there's absolutely no excuse to lose to Calgary. Ever.

See you next time, In the Box.

PS - I look forward to hearing what our readers think. If everyone could tell me the ways in which I'm full of shit, or which either of us could go and fuck ourselves—in the comments section here or over on Twitter—that would be mucho appreciado. —CD

@inthebox
inthebox@vueweekly.com

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