Hawks captain Dirk Graham may not play Friday night in Game 4 of the Campbell Conference final if the swelling on one hand doesn`t recede.
Graham was injured Wednesday night in Game 3 when his hand was jammed by ex-Hawk defenseman Dave Manson.
”It should have been a charging penalty,” coach Mike Keenan said of what he perceived as a missed call by referee Bill McCreary.
Graham was one of the few who didn`t practice Thursday. Most of the regulars worked out, including Jeremy Roenick and Steve Larmer. The defensive tandem of Chris Chelios and Steve Smith didn`t take the ice, however.
– Nobody in Edmonton is giving the Oilers much chance to avoid being swept. Oilers coach Ted Green did nothing to allay this feeling when he left Northlands Coliseum Thursday carrying a golf club.
– The Hawks have lost 14 straight playoff rounds to teams from Canada. The last time they beat a team from this country was in 1962, overcoming Montreal in six games in the Stanley Cup semifinals.
– The Oilers intend to mail film of Hawk Jocelyn Lemieux`s high-sticking whack in Dave Maley`s face to the National Hockey League, asking that further disciplinary action be taken other than the ejection and 5-minute penalty he received.
”There was a deliberate attempt to insert a steel plate in the guy`s head,” said Green. ”It`s a good thing he was wearing a helmet. He could have been decapitated.”
Said Maley: ”I thought a boulder hit me.”
Lemieux scoffed at the chance of a suspension.
”They can do whatever they want,” he said. ”I was just trying to get the guy`s stick off me. I wasn`t trying to do that. If they called hooking and holding penalties in this series, it wouldn`t have happened.”
– Edmonton`s Scott Mellanby (bruised foot) and Anatoli Semenov (separated shoulder) might sit out Game 4. If so, Green will replace them with two of these three players: Scott Thornton, Tyler Wright and Steven Rice.
– Craig MacTavish has been the best Oiler in the series besides goalie Bill Ranford. He noted with tongue in cheek on Thursday that the Hawks are on such a roll in winning 10 straight games that they aren`t even complaining about Keenan.
”They are starting to think Keenan is a pretty good guy,” he said. ”By now, there`s usually controversy over some of his moves.”