Struggling Oilers make coaching change
February 10th, 2017 -
Sitting at 15 points outside of the last Wild Card spot in the West, the Oilers decided now was the time to pull the trigger on a coaching change that had been rumoured for at least a month. Dallas Eakins was in his fourth year behind the bench for the Oilers and the team is mired in it's worst season under him yet. Expectations had been much higher for a team with multiple recent top picks and a lot of offensive fire power but injuries and lack of results ended up costing Eakins his job as Edmonton's front office looks for answers.
Their answer for now behind the bench will be well known hockey name Brent Sutter. Sutter will bring his hard nosed personality to the job and see if he can get more from this group than Eakins did. Sutter has spent time coaching in the NHL for Calgary and New Jersey. He is good at managing games and adjusting tactis, great at coaching the forward group and is a decent talent evaluator as well. The native of Viking, Alberta will look to turn around the fortunes of this Alberta franchise. Sutter won't pull any punches with his new players, saying today that "A lot of people might see this as a flawed team. I think they would be right. But it isn't going to stay that way for long."