In retrospect and especially what we've learned from comments from a few different guys who are insiders, Jay Woodcroft was part of the problem. He instituted a new defensive scheme that he wasn't able to convey very well to the team and when it didn't go as planned he kinda panicked and started regressing to man-to-man coverage. Knoblauch came in and immediately implemented his own zone coverage and stuck with it until in the end the Oilers were actually pretty good at it as the defensive analytics would support. Combine that with Paul Coffey ending up being like a defence whisperer getting those guys to play with confidence and you saw a huge improvement in all defensive analytics for the Oilers making them a top-ten defensive team.
In retrospect and especially what we've learned from comments from a few different guys who are insiders, Jay Woodcroft was part of the problem. He instituted a new defensive scheme that he wasn't able to convey very well to the team and when it didn't go as planned he kinda panicked and started regressing to man-to-man coverage. Knoblauch came in and immediately implemented his own zone coverage and stuck with it until in the end the Oilers were actually pretty good at it as the defensive analytics would support. Combine that with Paul Coffey ending up being like a defence whisperer getting those guys to play with confidence and you saw a huge improvement in all defensive analytics for the Oilers making them a top-ten defensive team.
I miss you all!!
And then what happened?