EDMONTON -- The Oilers are a far cry from where they were just a week ago. After big win against St. Louis and and dominating performance against Calgary, the Oilers have followed that up with a pair of uninspired losses to Arizona and now San Jose, who left Rogers Place Thursday night with a 6-3 win.

It appeared the Oilers found their stride last month with a 6-2-1 record, however, Edmonton has now dropped two of their first three games in February, giving off more of a December feel – when they won just five of 14 games.

Fans were feeling pretty good early. Before the game started the Oilers sent hometown boy, Tyler Benson, to take a lap by himself before his teammates joined him for warmups ahead of his long-awaited NHL debut. Oilers head coach Dave Tippet made sure his debut was worth the wait, sending him out to start the game on a line with Connor McDavid.

It seemed the Oilers fed off the energy early. A favourable bounce set up Sam Gagne for his fourth goal of the season less than five minutes into the game and just over a minute later, Connor McDavid scored a typical McDavid goal – blowing by Sharks defenceman Mario Ferraro before flipping the puck over Aaron Dell’s blocker for his team-leading 30th goal of the season, giving the Oilers an early 2-0 lead.

But then it got ugly.

Timo Meier led the Sharks attack with two of the five unanswered goals that followed, none of which were particularly pretty.

And it’s not like the Sharks were overpowering the Oilers; they were simply outworking them.

If it weren’t Maxim Letunov’s first NHL goal, the Sharks’ go-ahead goal certainly wouldn’t be memorable. Even with two defenders within arm’s reach of him, Letunov had time to corral a rebound, turn around and shoot it into a net left wide open by a very out of position Mikko Koskinen. When the puck crossed the line, there were four orange jerseys to the one white Sharks jersey – one of the many battles Edmonton lost on Thursday.

“It's not as if we're giving outnumbered rushes, we're just getting out competed and beat on plays in our zone,” Tippet said after the game. “When you're in a battle, there is two guys going to the net, and you are side by side, one guy wins and one guy doesn’t. We didn’t win enough of those.”

In the thick of a race for the Pacific Division crown, the Oilers’ captain expressed his disappointment with his team’s performance.

“We shouldn’t need any motivation,” McDavid said. “We’re in a tight division playoff race and every night matters so we shouldn’t be looking for reasons to have emotion in games, it’s right there and we just have to bring it every night.”

Darnell Nurse put the onus on himself and his teammates.

 “It’s on us to find a way to motivate each other,” Nurse said. “There is no excuse for it, we are in a tight race.”

The consistent dominance of McDavid and Leon Draisaitl has allowed Edmonton to remain at or near the top of the Pacific Division standings all season. And recently, the team has been developing some much needed depth, getting more point production throughout the lineup in the second half of the season.

But the inability to play at a high level for a full 60 minutes continues to plague the Oil.

 “Some nights when you’re not feeling great, that’s the time you need to bear down and find a way to get points,” said Oilers defenceman, Adam Larsson, “I thought tonight was one of those nights where we could have found a way to get two points out of it and we didn’t.”  

LOOKING AHEAD

There isn’t much time to dwell on these past two games. The Oilers will practice on Friday in preparation for the Nashville Predators on Saturday whose last road loss was to the Oilers on Jan. 14.

“I think we come to work tomorrow, practice hard, practice with emotion and practice hard against each other, battle with each other and get ready for a tough test on Saturday,” McDavid said.

The Oilers remain three points back of the division-leading Canucks, though with Vegas beating up on Florida 7-2, Edmonton slips to third place with Arizona and Calgary hot on their tail.