How About Hemsky

This may be a surprise to you, but Ales Hemsky is one of the hottest players in the NHL right now. Not many people seem to know about that. Why that is, it's anyone's guess. Probably because he plays in Edmonton. Wait, let me clarify. That's not a knock on the "City of Champions" at all. So please, I don't want to see my mailbox stuffed with hate mail from Edmontonians. Only phone numbers from foxy ladies.

What I mean by that, is the Oilers usually play pretty late at night. Most of their games start at 10pm, and by that time most are sleeping. Or in my case, romancing international super models. So sometimes it can be pretty hard to catch their games.

If you have been able to catch some Oilers coverage, then you don't need me to tell you how on fire Ales Hemsky has been as of late. The Czech has 10 points in his last 5 games, which included an amazing four point night on Tuesday against Columbus.

So consider this as your heads up. The next time an Oilers game is on, knock back a Beaver Buzz or two (my favourite Canadian energy drink) and stay up and watch how talented Hemsky is. And in my case, I'll try and move my romancing of international super models to the afternoon. "Sky rockets in flight, afternoon delight," as Ron Burgundy and the Channel 4 News Team once sang. Afternoon delight indeed.

Here are Hemsky's two highlight reel goals from Wednesday night against the Blue Jackets...

Notable Quotable of the Day

"I guess every time we call somebody up we have to defend why it isn't Robbie. I think the bottom line is it's up to Robbie to be a decent player down there. We all know what he can do, he's got decent hands and he can work the power play OK, but he's slow and he's not a physical player, he's soft at this level. There are a lot of things he needs to address in his game to be the guy who gets called up. It's getting to the point where you have to be honest. He's not helping them (Springfield) particularly right now, and there's no reason to think he's going to come up here and help us given those circumstances."

- Edmonton Oilers bench boss Craig MacTavish with some real talk on why Robbie Schremp isn't good enough for the Oilers. Too bad Robbie didn't play with Kevin Lowe in the 80's like MacTavish did. That seems to be a guaranteed way to stay with the big club even with minimal talent.

Morning After Meltdown: Edmonton Oilers

I almost feel bad for giving the Morning After Meltdown to the Edmonton Oilers. Going into their Monday night game against the Red Wings, everybody had a feeling it wouldn't go well for the Oil.

Just consider all the drama the team had going on earlier in the day. Oilers head coach Craig MacTavish ripped last year's leading scorer Dustin Penner, who's off to a slow start this year, saying, "He's not competitive enough or fit enough to help us, so why put him back in? He's never been fit enough to help us. We signed him to be a top-two line player and that's kind of where it ended. The difference was we thought the contract was a starting point, and he's viewed it as a finish line."

MacTavish went on to say, "It's been one thing after another. I can't watch it for - certainly not another two and-a-half years." Ouch!

You know that sort of thing messes with the team's psyche. And that was quite evident Monday night. The Oilers were outshot 41-21 and ended up being shutout 4-0. Did I mention that the Wings started their back-up goalie Ty Conklin who used to play for Edmonton? Yeah it was that ugly for the Oilers.

And to add insult to injury, or I guess in this case injury to insult, Oilers star Fernando Pisani broke his ankle as he slid into the boards feet first as he battled for the puck with the Red Wings’ Nicklas Lidstrom with a little under 15 minutes left in the third period. MacTavish said that Pisani, who was on crutches after the game, would be out at least a month.

So for putting in a weak showing in Motown against the Wings on Monday, the Edmonton Oilers are awarded the Morning After Meltdown.

Morning After Meltdown: Edmonton Oilers

It's hard to win a game when you're down 5-0 at the end of two periods. The Edmonton Oilers tried, but not showing up for the first 40 minutes really hurt them.

When the Pittsburgh Penguins jumped out to that 5-0 lead, it looked like the game was locked up, over with, kaput! Then the Oilers put together a great four goal run in the third but just couldn't notch that fifth one to tie it up. So it definitely was locked up, over with, kaput! Boy, I really like writing the word kaput.

Smart thinking by the Pens though to bury the Oilers early and build up such a lead as to prevent any late game comebacks. Too bad for Edmonton that Mathieu Garon couldn't catch a cold in net, let alone a puck during the first two periods of Thursday night's affair.

So even though they scored four goals in the third period, it still wasn't enough after getting blown out during the first 40 minutes. And it's for this reason that the Edmonton Oilers are awarded the Morning After Meltdown.

Oilers Unveil Third Jersey

Third jersey mania continues as today the Edmonton Oilers officially unveiled their third jersey for the 2008-09 season.

It's a solid throwback to the dynasty years of the 80's when the likes of Gretzky, Messier, Kurri, Andersen, and Fuhr were unstoppable.

There's really nothing bad to say about this sweater. You can't go wrong with a classic. Well unless you're the Vancouver Canucks and you go with those terrible yellow v-neck sweaters. Or if you're at a house party and you pop in your Vanilla Ice cassette and proceed to do his full Ice Ice Baby dance. Those times you can definitely go wrong with a classic.