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Originally Posted by Cleveland Steam Whistle
I don't think the Oilers rebuild is working in the way they would like at all, and maybe its because of the shortened season, but it does feel to me like they did take a small step forward this year.
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Certainly they did, and certainly they have to be looking at it that way, but the short season itself lends one to wonder if that was illusionary. Basically, it looks like Calgary and Edmonton are locked into the 12/13 spots in the west. From Edmonton's perspective, that is definitely an improvement on 14th (and about 25/26 overall rather than 29th), but as far a steps forward goes, that's not much.
But the shortened season magnifies little streaks by a significant percentage. Just as some Flames fans deluded themselves into thinking we'd get a top three pick on the basis of that massive road losing streak, the Oilers need to hope that a short winning streak that put them momentarily in 8th was an actual step forward and not an aberration like their start to the 2011-12 season was.
What would certainly concern me from an Oilers perspective is that other than that five game winning streak, there was only two other occasions where Edmonton won more than one consecutive game - and they were both two gamers. From that perspective, they may have actually taken a small step backward compared to last season when they had a six game winning streak, and five 2-3 game streaks over a full season. This team, frankly, still does not know how to win.