Oil boils for 6!

What a night for my hockey team. Edmonton may very well start a new TV series this season - The NHL's I Love the 80's, because the Oilers certainly looked like the 80's version of the franchise, when they would just try to outscore opponents with lots of offense.

What a stunner this game was.

Edmonton goes up 1-0. Okay, cool, I thought. It's always good to get the first goal in your own barn - it gets the crowd excited and revs up the players.

About 25 minutes of hockey time later, the Oilers were down 4-1 on the heels of Jonathan Cheecho's natural hat trick and four unanswered goals by the Sharks. Oh Christ, I thought- not a good week; first the Cowboys, now the Oilers.

But, I'm glad I stuck with the game while I did my work. Five Edmonton unanswered goals later, the Oilers Ryan Smyth (above, scoring his first of the night) snagged a natural hat trick of his own, scoring three in a span of 2:01, breaking Wayne Gretzky's previous team record by 17 seconds. Now that's a good night.

Of particular note is goal number six tonight by the Oilers. The New NHL made it possible - under the old rules, the play would have been a two-line pass, but that rule was eliminated before last season. Ya gotta just love Ales Hemsky comin' out of the box, homerun pass on his tape... SCORE!

I think tonight's game will be a reflection of this year's Oilers, but I hope not all season. The young defense will suffer lapses, but with an obscenely deep group of forwards, this team can flash hot, in a hurry. But, I'm sure Head Coach Craig MacTavish would rather have the team play a little more defense. It didn't help either team that the refs were panting from blowing their whistles tonight from calling a very tight game for a total of 15 penalties.

There's 79 more games to go, but I don't know if my heart can take it.

Pronger who? Joffrey Lupul, who came to Edmonton in the Pronger deal, got his second of the season tonight. So far, so good.

Go Oilers!