from Mark Spector of Sportsnet,

There are voices in Edmonton. Voices who bear Stanley Cup rings from the Oilers glory years, many of them don’t believe McLellan should be the Oilers head coach. Others would have him remain as a coach, but want to install at least one of their own to help him out.

We get that. Show us an organization that loses as much as this one has, and we’ll show you a team with a bunch of voices competing to be heard. Win, and it all goes away.

But, it’s not going away in Edmonton, where the alumni’s post-game strategizing has been dubbed “The Red Wine Summits.” That much became obvious this season when somebody above Chiarelli decided that Paul Coffey should be hired.

Someone, almost certainly in conversation with owner Daryl Katz — always vulnerable to being persuaded that The Old Boys Club is the answer — made this failed Coffey experiment happen. And it became a laughing point around the NHL.

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