Mike Babcock’s imprint on the Oilers is showing up in one of the simplest places on the ice: what they do with the puck at the blue line.
Edmonton has opened the season looking cleaner, tighter and far more organized, and the numbers back it up. The Oilers lead the league in expected goals against (xGA), which has given their goaltenders a much steadier night-to-night workload.
Devon Levi has been excellent, and Tristan Jarry has looked revitalized as well. The common thread is a team that is buying in, defending with more structure and cutting down on the kind of chaos that used to follow them around.
One of the biggest shifts is also one of the least glamorous. The Oilers are dumping the puck in more often.
That might not thrill fans who love controlled entries and end-to-end rushes, but Babcock has long believed there’s value in getting the puck deep and making the other team turn. Asked why Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl are doing it more often, he explained it plainly:
“I can’t go off what happened in the past. I can just go off puck decisions.
We don’t like to pass it in the track. We like playing in the O-zone and spend as much time there as we can because it’s more fun.
And so sometimes it doesn’t matter how good you are, you got to make the D-turn every time down the ice. So if you’re less skilled, sometimes you put it in more often. If you’re more skilled, you don’t have to as much, but you still got to make the right play.
They can’t be leaving the zone with the puck because you made a hope play. So that’s just our focus.”
That’s the heart of the change. Edmonton spent years forcing plays through the neutral zone and paying for it with dangerous turnovers and Grade-A chances going back the other way. Babcock’s version asks for something less flashy but a lot safer: avoid the risky pass, get the puck in deep, and make the opponent defend 200 feet.
He was also asked whether there’s really such a thing as a good dump-in versus a bad one based on where the puck is placed. His answer leaned hard toward the bigger picture:
“Yeah, that’s great. We talk about this all the time, even the coaches from, ‘Well, we made a bad dump.’
Yeah, but you forgot they had F3 and the guy was tracking you from behind, and you were just dying to get to the red line. What’s a bad dump? You made them turn.
So that’s a fantasy world we live in that you say, ‘Okay, I’m going to lay it in the right spot every time.’
Some nights their goalie’s unbelievable with the puck, but if they’re chasing you and they got you cut off, what do you do? You turn it over or you get it deep? Deep’s probably better.”
Babcock’s point is straightforward: don’t get seduced by the perfect play when the safer one is sitting right there. If the opposition has you tracked down and the lane is gone, the priority is avoiding the turnover that turns into a rush the other way.
That approach is a major departure from the version of Edmonton fans have been used to. For years, the Oilers lived in the kind of high-event hockey many people jokingly call “crack hockey” - wild, entertaining, and full of odd-man rushes in both directions. It made for some unforgettable nights, including playoff runs that were still way more chaotic than most teams would dare to play in the postseason.
The problem was always the same: a style like that puts enormous stress on the defense and goaltending. Edmonton often seemed to believe it could simply flip a switch and outscore everything.
Sometimes it did. But last season brought a harsh reminder that the margins are thinner than that.
This year, the structure looks far more sustainable. Players appear to know their jobs more clearly.
Accountability runs deeper through the lineup. The star talent still has freedom, but the team as a whole is playing with more discipline and less nightly freelancing.
The results are hard to miss. At 7-1-1, the Oilers own their best start in years and sit atop the league in points percentage.
Babcock is moving fast, and the roster has followed him. The message is simple, even if it changes the feel of the team: dump it in, play a cleaner game, and trust the process.
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The biggest question now is where Nugent-Hopkins fits once the puck drops. Edmonton is expected to use him in a prominent second-line role, and the ripple effect could be felt throughout the forward group as the staff sorts out the best mix around him. With the Oilers trying to settle into a rhythm early, his return adds needed stability, but it also forces a lineup decision that could reshape the balance of the entire top six. [Read more 🡒]