With the Oilers being knocked out of the playoffs, Canada’s Stanley Cup drought extends into a third decade and the hunger from superstars Conor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl continues to grow. For the Oilers, it’s reaching a point where anything short of winning the cup is going to be deemed a failure, especially as the prime years of McDavid and Draisaitl continue to pass by. However, hockey’s a team sport and at the end of the day, as much as this team sort of lives and dies by those two players, it’s going to require a collective effort for this team to get where they need to be. All things considered, this is by far the best Edmonton team the Oilers have iced in a very long time but there’s always room to improve. A piece of good news for Oilers fans is teams almost never win when they’re supposed to. Look at the Lightning, Washington, etc. It often takes a lot of disappointment and heartbreak making the moment that cup gets lifted all the more sweeter. Before we get into the big questions and how the Oilers are going to move forward from here, let’s take a look at how they got there.
To be honest, the Oilers made it farther than I had in my bracket as I saw them losing to the Kings in a similar fashion as they did Vegas. The biggest thing that worked for the Oilers this year and especially in the postseason was special teams and obviously the insane impact McDavid and Draisaitl have night in and night out. One of the most impressive things that really came from the Oilers run here was just how good Leon Draisaitl is. A lot of people don’t realize as he often gets overshadowed by the best player in the world also on his team, but Leon Draisaitl is probably a top three player in the league. Through Edmonton’s first ten games in the postseason, Draisaitl had 13 goals, the most any player has had since 1983 and third highest through ten games in over a century. It truly is a shame that on a national level, most audiences don’t get to see all that much of two of the greatest players to play the sport both all time and certainly in the modern era.
In addition to those two’s insane skill levels, the Oilers special teams are significantly a strength of theirs. So much so, they’re statistically more likely to score than not every time they are on the power play. A large part of that is thanks to McDavid and Draisaitl with Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Zach Hyman picking up assists here and there. Evan Bouchard had a bit ot a standout playoff on the back end with four goals and 13 assists. Among the questions for the Oilers, what his next contract will look like will be a big one as he is set to become a restricted free agent. The Oilers could be forced to make some moves as they don’t have a ton of cap space to work with. After the 40 point season Bouchard had, you have to think they’re going to want to lock him up long term as he’s arguably their best defender.
The high moment for Edmonton came following their Round 1, Game 3 overtime loss to LA where they followed it up with three wins in a row to win the series and move on to the Conference semifinals. Despite winning Game four in pretty dominant fashion, a game changing moment, and not a good one, came towards the end of regulation when Alex Pietrangelo two handed Leon Draisaitl in the arm after a goal. I’m all for playing the game with passion and intensity but that decision by Pietrangelo was classless and worthy of the one game suspension he was assigned and honestly, probably deserved more. Personally, I was a bit surprised that Pietrangelo did that but nevertheless, the series went on. The Oilers would end up losing Game 5 by one goal which would be the low moment before dropping Game 6 5-2 to wrap up the series.
This biggest question for Edmonton following another early playoff exit is simple, is patience a virtue? Expectations aside, this Oilers team had a really good year despite some early stints where things weren’t clicking. Patience may just be what this team needs as the pieces are beginning to fall into place and there isn’t a ton of room for change. Their main priority is going to be working out an Evan Bouchard extension and they may need to shed some salary to do so. Not only do they need to get him under contract but if there’s any area this team needs to improve in, it’s defense. Albeit, I didn’t watch a ton of Oilers games this season, but Vincent Desharnais and Cody Ceci can’t be integral parts to a cup contending team’s D-core. As far as the forwards go, they could consider bringing most if not all of that group back and should be in a pretty good spot.
Aside from Evan Bouchard, the Oilers don’t have a ton of work to do in the off-season in terms of restricted free agents. Ryan McLeod and Klim Kostin are among the only other RFA’s that will be in need of new contracts and while they have likely earned pay raises from their league minimum range deals, it shouldn’t be anything that breaks the bank. As far as pending UFA’s go, they’re set to lose Devin Shore, Derek Ryan, Mathias Janmark and Nick Bjugstad. Of the four, you have to think Bjugstad is worth an attempt at extending but between the next Bouchard contract and the potential to pick up similar role players on cheaper deals, I don’t imagine the Oilers worry too much about re-signing any of them. Guys like Dylan Hollowell, Ryan McLeod, Klim Kostin could be ready for bigger roles as well as in the system guys like Tyler Benson, Raphael Lavoie, and Xavier Bourgault who could be ready to make the jump.
I mentioned how this team is going to be in a bit of a cap crunch which will pose challenges for Evan Bouchard’s extension among other things. One of their biggest cap concerns at the moment is how much money they have invested in goaltending that is still posing question marks. Last summer, they signed Jack Campbell to a big five year, $5 million AAV extension with a modified no trade clause. Not even a full season into that extension, they opted to give prospect Stuart Skinner a chance, in which he became a literal All-Star and earned himself a multi year extension just south of a $3 million AAV. Between both of them, the Oilers still struggled to keep the puck out of the net in the postseason which puts them in a difficult situation. You have to think long term they want Skinner to be the guy but they already committed to Jack Campbell for the next four seasons who very well might have reached his peak already.
There aren’t a ton of opportunities for Edmonton to really shed cap unless they find someone willing to take on Jack Campbell, Cody Ceci or do something drastic and shop Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. They do have some dead cap coming off the books this season so in a perfect world, I imagine the Oilers will run back the majority of this group, look to give some youngins more of an opportunity and fill the holes with the best cheap depth pieces they can come across in free agency. Improving defensively should be a huge priority for them but they aren’t going to have a lot of money to spend fixing that problem in free agency. They’ll look to guys like Phillip Broberg and Markus Niemelainen to take a step forward but will certainly rely on Darnell Nurse, Evan Bouchard and Mathias Ekholm to carry a bulk of the workload on the backend, especially come playoff time next year.
Moving forward, the Oilers are going to be longing for the regular season to end as they are officially in win now mode. With an added year of development for some younger players and the right pieces falling to pace come free agency and trade deadline time, there’s no reason they shouldn’t be able to make a run next year. Goaltending will continue to be a huge question mark when the games that matter come around. They have two guys capable of it, they just may need to bank on it happening at the right time. I see them being a team that isn’t so busy over the summer but could very well be a huge buyer at the trade deadline next spring. For as disappointing as this loss may be, there’s enough proof for Oilers fans to feel as strongly as they ever have about this team moving forward.
Chris Feldman
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