May 2, 2006
Fresh faces push Oilers past first-place Red Wings
Oilers head to the second-round for the first time in eight years.
By Wendel Clark

The team's proverbial 'icing on the cake' came in the later stages of the regular season when Oilers general manager Kevin Lowe strengthened almost every aspect of the roster by bolstering the blueline with Jaroslav Spacek and Dick Tarnstrom, securing the goal by bringing in Dwayne Roloson, and adding much needed speed and tenacity in the form of Sergei Samsonov. 

When you add players that are fast and creative, they open the ice up for the other guys on the roster and they insert a new dimension to the team. 

Samsonov added another level of skill that the Oilers desperately needed. He is a little guy who can skate, turn and spin off the opposition, draw penalties and he gets to play on a good set of ice. The better he's skating, the better he plays.

Roloson, meanwhile, received the chance to prove himself, and the club has played better in front of him.

Heading into the playoffs against the NHL's best team, the Detroit Red Wings, the Oilers knew they were in for a battle.

In what has been deemed a shocking series, the eighth-seeded Oilers jumped past the first-place Wings in six hard-fought games. 

Edmonton has been playing their new style of hockey for the past two months just to get into the playoffs and they carried that momentum right through the first round. 

Three of the four Western "underdog" teams did that, with Colorado upsetting Dallas and San Jose blanking Nashville in five games. 

All of the teams doing well in the playoffs right now are the teams that had to battle right down to the end for a playoff spot – and the most unpredictable thing about the playoffs is the first round.

With all the points the Wings had, and how they performed all season long, Detroit should have steamrolled right over the Oilers, but that didn't happen.

The Oilers' defensive core, led by Pronger and team captain Jason Smith, shut down the Red Wings' brass. 

Brendan Shanahan, Pavel Datsyuk and Nicklas Lidstrom combined for only two goals and five assists. It wasn't from a lack of shots, they just were not able to finish they way they did in the regular season.

But for a team that good, the biggest surprise of the series probably was the final period of Game 6, when the Wings let a 2-0 lead slip away into a 4-3 loss.

Thanks to the great speed of the likes of Samsonov and Hemsky, the Oilers' counterattack was exception during their six-game series. The team's defense was outstanding and Roloson performed the way they thought he could.

And now, the Oilers have some time to rest before the second-round, while the Red Wings try to answer some of the questions that will most certainly be asked.

But if you are a Detroit fan, the most pressing piece of information you want to know is: Will Steve Yzerman and Chris Chelios retire?

That choice is entirely up to them. 

For Yzerman, his decision will ultimately depend on how his body feels. Players know whether or not they want to really hang up their skates, and he might be inching towards a yes.

As for Chelios, he may play until the league decides to throw him out. He loves the game, and his body has stood its ground. He may have a better chance of playing another season, more so than Yzerman does.

So as we wait to hear the fates of those two future Hall-of-Famers, the Oilers wait – impatiently – for their next opponent.
 

Wendel Clark, drafted first-overall by the Toronto Maple Leafs in the 1985 NHL Entry Draft, played in 793 career NHL games with six different organizations. Over his career, the former Leafs captain accumulated 330 goals, 234 assists and 1,690 penalty minutes. Now, as a columnist for TheFourthPeriod.com, he offers his "17-cents" on the NHL throughout the entire season. Check out Wendel Clark's column every week, exclusively on TheFourthPeriod.com.