Oilers Missing on Thursday

A couple faces were missing from the Oilers' line-up on Thursday night as they took on the Columbus Blue Jackets.  It was a scheduled night off for their number one goalie, Nikolai Khabibulin, giving Devan Dubnyk the start and having Jeff Deslauriers as back-up.  Also, Kurtis Foster was held out of the line-up as well due to an illness as well.

Khabibulin should be back to his normal starting routine in the next game, while Foster will be day-to-day for the time being.  The Oilers are in Chicago to take on the Blackhawks on Friday night.

Khabibulin has been playing pretty well for the Oilers, despite their current record.  In seven games started, Khabibulin has a 2-4-1 record with a shutout, totaling 6 points in the pool.  The shutout nicely pads the stats for him, making his scoring rate for the pool fairly reasonable.

Foster has been off to a slower start for the Oilers, only picking up 1 goal and 1 assist in his seven games.  He has been getting the minutes on the power play, but the minutes have not translated into points just yet.

Khabibulin is a member of Stacey's pool team, which currently sits in 12th place in the standings, while Foster is a member of Clayton's pool team, which is way down in 19th spot.  The Oilers have not been very good for pool teams thus far, but it is still so early to start ragging on them.  These news bytes also shouldn't be too devastating to the long-term numbers for these pool teams.

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