Pisani to the IR – Edmonton’s roster is set

From Dan Tencer via Twitter the Oilers will be placing Pisani on the IR to start the season; he’s been battling back problems throughout camp. With Reddox being placed on waivers today too and Pouliot likely to sitting out for a while with an inflamed pubic bone – ouch – it looks like the Oilers 23 man roster is set. This means that Stone and Pouliot, who I thought would be the last two cuts, hang around for a while.

So with the 23 man roster set it’s time to start talking lines. At practice today the Oilers went with this lineup for their forwards:

Jacques – Horcoff – Hemsky
O’Sullivan – Comrie – Stone
Penner -Brule – Cogliano
Moreau – Gagner – Stortini

I like to gamble. Actually I love to gamble. And it is a good thing I don’t bet on the Oil because I’d have bet my house against Jacques on the top line to start the year. He’s played in that role for a couple of the preseason games and the line has meshed well in the short time they’ve been together. Jacques is a better skater than Penner so if he can keep his game at the level it’s at right now he could be a hell of a fit on that line.

No shocker that Comrie and O’Sullivan are playing together since they’ve been virtually joined at the hip through camp, with good results too. Comrie lead all players in the league with ten points in the preseason, O’Sullivan added another seven points. Yeah it’s preseason but that kind of instant chemistry is exciting.

Gagner on the fourth line is a little surprising given his skill level but Quinn might be trying to send him a message since he’s been pretty flat in the preseason so far and has had slow starts in both of his seasons so far. From what I’ve seen in the preseason I think Gagner and Brule could easily switch places if Gagner gets the message and plays well or if that third line stumbles. If these lines do work well you might see the Oil move Gagner up onto the number one powerplay unit to get him a little more ice time or to take some pressure off of Jacques.

The other two forwards that the Oil will be keeping are Nilsson and MacIntyre. Even though he didn’t see time today on one of the top four lines I would expect that MacIntyre is on the ice Saturday night when the Oil drop the puck on their season against Calgary.