The Olympics gave the Edmonton Oilers a rare three-week reset after a disappointing stretch of hockey. They limped into the break with an underwhelming 4-5 record despite playing eight of those nine games at home.

Coming out of the pause, they introduced major changes across both personnel and systems. They traded for Jason Dickinson, Connor Murphy and Colton Dach, adjusted their breakouts, and completely overhauled their penalty kill.

Despite the changes, Edmonton’s record over the last nine games is 4-4-1, nearly identical to the nine games before the Olympics. It’s a disappointing result, but make no mistake: the Oilers are playing very differently, and there are reasons to be optimistic. I’ll be looking under the hood to see what’s different about the team lately and where things are trending.

Team defence

In the past few weeks, the Oilers have been doing a much better job of controlling play at 5-on-5, and most of that improvement has come from their defence. Before the Olympics, Edmonton ranked 27th in expected goals against, but since then, they’re fourth-best in the NHL.

Back in early February, when the team was spiralling defensively, Kris Knoblauch commented on the number of quality looks they were giving up.

“The quality of the chances is something that has to be addressed,” he said. “Less breakaways or two-on-ones, odd man rushes, those kinds of things, where that is leading to goals. It has to get better. Like more perimeter shots.”

Knoblauch was right: it wasn’t so much the volume of chances the Oilers were giving up, but the ones they were conceding were often from the slot or off the rush.

Over the last nine games, Edmonton’s shots against per game have hardly changed, but there’s been a significant reduction in expected goals. That suggests the Oilers are giving up far more shots from the outside and fewer from the high-danger areas.

There are a few key differences that have led to the improved defensive play, starting with the breakouts. For most of the season, the Oilers’ forwards were blowing the zone without any support down low for the defence. There was too much distance between the forwards and the defence, and opposing teams could read the stretch passes.

The poor breakouts often led to turnovers, odd-man rushes, and lethal counterattacks. Lately, the Oilers have been much more disciplined in supporting the forwards down low on breakouts, and these types of chances have become fewer and farther between.

Another change Edmonton has made is to its personnel. Dickinson and Murphy are both top-15 defensive players at their positions. While........

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