EDMONTON—Imperial, Saskatchewan, is just another pimple on the prairie, as my father used to say. And he could tell—he was from Watrous, Sask., just half an hour north.
“There are 390 people in our city,” said a native of the Empire and Edmonton Oilers head coach Chris Knoblauch. “Then, of course, the surrounding area with all the farmers.”
According to Wikipedia, Imperial has two “standouts”: Knoblauch and his goalie in Sunday's 4-3 win over the Vegas Golden Knights. Connor Ingram.
What were they doing at home on Sunday night, the only two guys with “Welcome to Imperial, Home of…” signs, both on the same team in an NHL game?
“I bet they watched it at the skating rink. Maybe at the bar,” Ingram said. “I’ll have to write to Dad and see what he’s up to.”
The crazy thing is that Knoblauch and Ingram didn't know each other very well at home—they're 19 years apart in age. But in such a small town, two families are intertwined.
“His mom and dad worked at the school,” Knoblauch said. “Mr. Ingram was our seventh grade homeroom teacher. He was my soccer coach, track coach, volleyball coach, you name it. Yes, I know this family very well.”
“Mrs. Knoblauch, Holly, she was our registrar at my school my whole life,” Ingram told me back in November. “Bob (Chris’s dad) ran the rink when I was very little and then officiated just about every minor hockey game I ever played.”
It's crazy, isn't it, how fate brought these two to the same team at the same time that Ingram was resurrecting his career in the National Hockey League after spending time in the NHL/NHLPA program due to OCD – obsessive-compulsive disorder, a mental health condition characterized by uncontrollable, repetitive thoughts (obsessions) and repetitive behaviors (compulsive actions).
But Knoblauch had lost his No. 1 goalkeeper Tristan Jarry to injury – “He's out for a couple of weeks. At some point we won't see him until the New Year,” he said before the game – and he needed a “farm tender.”
Enter Ingram, who was looking for his game in Bakersfield after missing training camp and who hasn't played in the NHL since last February with Utah.
“There were a lot of days where I didn't think it would ever happen again,” Ingram said after his first NHL win in 10 months. “It's just a truth in this world. There are 64 places in the world where you can do this, so you don't take it for granted. Every day you're here it's a huge honor.”
If Ingram had to wait until his American League numbers were called up, he might have been in Bucko for a while. He had a 4.04 goals-against average and .856 save percentage for the AHL Condors, not the kind of numbers that had general manager Stan Bowman reaching for his phone.
But then Jarry got injured, and Ingram – at least for one day – took advantage of the opportunity. He was anything but a .856 goaltender, stopping 26 shots as the Oilers held the lead after jumping ahead 4-0.
“I think it’s easier (to play in the NHL) — what you think is going to happen happens,” Ingram said of the two leagues. “I rely a lot on reading the game. I was never a guy who was fast enough or quick enough to react, so I had to be one step ahead. It's easier in this league.”
“Ninety percent of the time the puck goes where you think it will go. But it's also a huge step. It's a lot faster than what I've been used to over the last couple of months.”
The game, in which Trent Frederic was sidelined after scoring just three points in 36 games, likely felt like another game to mark the end of a road trip for Edmonton, which had just completed a five-game road trip in Minnesota the day before. Coming home and beating a division rival in regulation is a huge task as Edmonton moves to within two points of first-place Anaheim, tied with Vegas on 42 points.
“They had to be a lot more tired than we were,” admitted Vegas head coach Bruce Cassidy, whose team lost the night before in Calgary. “This was their sixth game in nine days in six different cities.”
Connor McDavid was once again unstoppable, extending his hitting streak to 10 games. He scored 24 points in that span and outscored the Vegas defense Sunday to open the scoring and then added two helpers on an Oilers power play that went 2-for-3. This is by far the best PP rate in the NHL at 33.3%.
