The Edmonton Oilers are sitting on a 14-3-3 start, but the next stretch is where they find out whether that opening surge actually means something in the Stanley Cup race.
Edmonton has the edge in the Pacific Division right now, yet the picture around them is tight enough to keep the pressure on. The Vegas Golden Knights are 13-5-2 to begin the Ryan Craig era, the Minnesota Wild are one point ahead of the Oilers for the best record in the Western Conference, and the Nashville Predators are only six points back in the conference standings.
The Oilers already beat Minnesota earlier this season, and Nashville does not come up until January. The real measuring stick is coming fast: Edmonton hosts Vegas on November 24, and that game could go a long way toward deciding whether the Oilers can pull away in the division or end up in a much closer fight than expected.
That showdown arrives right after a six-game road trip that could tilt the whole picture one way or the other.
Edmonton opens the trip with a back-to-back against the Toronto Maple Leafs and Philadelphia Flyers. From there, the Oilers head to Florida for games against the Florida Panthers and Carolina Hurricanes, then return to Raleigh for a Saturday matinee against the Hurricanes before closing things out on Sunday, November 22 against the St. Louis Blues.
If the Oilers want to come out of that stretch looking like a true upper-tier contender, the bar should be 4-1-1.
The most manageable games on paper are Toronto, Philadelphia, and St. Louis. You could make a case for the Panthers being in that group instead of the Flyers, especially with Philadelphia having points in each of its last three games, but either way the idea is the same: Edmonton needs to bank points where it can.
Toronto is the easiest place to start. The Leafs have dropped five straight, were most recently beaten 5-2 by the Wild, and have been outscored 22-9 during that skid.
That slide has left them six points behind the Panthers for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference and has also fueled backlash over the decision to hire Jim Hiller as head coach. As TSN’s James Duthie put it, “it could get ugly.”
St. Louis has a better record than the other two, but the Blues have not exactly been steady.
Four of their last six games have seen them allow at least three goals, and they are 1-2-1 in those contests. When they do win, it tends to be tight and low-scoring: just under half of their nine victories have come by one goal, and five of their wins have featured a combined total of five goals or fewer.
The formula against them is simple. If Edmonton can push the pace early and keep the pressure on, it can expose a Blues team that has looked like a one-goaltender operation.
That lines up with their season overall, since seven of St. Louis’ eight regulation losses have come by at least two goals.
Philadelphia is the trickiest of that first cluster. The Flyers are the hottest of the three and may carry the most danger of a slip for Edmonton. The Oilers have not put together a winning streak against Philadelphia since the pandemic, and that only happened twice in the past 11 years of the matchup.
The other half of the trip brings a different kind of challenge.
Tampa Bay has won six of its last eight, and even the two losses were close calls. One came in a shootout against Nashville, while the other was decided at the very last second against Winnipeg. That run has pushed the Lightning to the top of the Atlantic Division after they had spent much of the previous few days in third.
Florida has not been as dominant as it has been in recent seasons, even if the Panthers have still had their moments against Edmonton in the past. They are 11-7-2, but they have not won more than three in a row and have already dropped two straight on two separate occasions. Matthew Tkachuk is among the league leaders in points, but the Panthers are only mid-table defensively and are giving up three goals per game.
Then there is Carolina, where the Oilers will be trying to do something they have not done since the league moved to a two-game regular-season setup against every opponent. Edmonton has never swept a defending Stanley Cup champion in a head-to-head series, and it has not gone perfect in the regular season against such a team since 2007-08. That season did include the Oilers’ lone Stanley Cup rematch win against the Hurricanes, so the number carries a little extra curiosity.
If Edmonton can pull that off, it would collect four valuable points in a spot where not many teams are likely to do the same. That would be enough to keep the Oilers in strong shape in the Pacific Division and in the broader league standings.
The most realistic expectation is that Edmonton beats Toronto, Philadelphia, and St. Louis, takes one of the games against Florida or Tampa Bay, and at minimum grabs an overtime point against either the Lightning or Hurricanes. That would be enough to show the Oilers can handle the teams they are supposed to beat while staying in touch with the league’s best.
And with this trip split between the kind of games they should win and the kind that can expose them, it is a real chance for Edmonton to separate itself from versions of the franchise that might have let the whole thing slip.
In Other News...
Flyers Loss Added To An Oilers Trend With Huge Stakes
Connor McDavid and the Oilers have given themselves another early-season cushion, beating the Philadelphia Flyers in overtime to improve to 14-3-3 and briefly move atop the NHL standings with 31 points. It has been a fast start by any measure, and one that puts Edmonton in a familiar place: right in the middle of the leagues conversation before December has even arrived.
The bigger question is what comes next, because this kind of opening has not been new territory for the Oilers. Edmonton has now reached at least 30 points through its first 20 games for the fifth time, and the team has lived through a range of endings after those hot starts. The recent history is what makes this stretch feel so loaded, with the early points piling up and the pressure to turn them into something lasting only growing from here. [Read more 🡒]
Babcocks Return To Toronto Adds Extra Heat For The Oilers
Mike Babcocks return to Toronto gives this meeting a little extra edge, even before the puck drops. Now behind the bench for the Oilers, he is walking back into the building where he once coached the Maple Leafs, a stop that included both real success and plenty of difficult moments. Edmonton arrives with the kind of standing that changes the tone of a road trip, sitting atop the Pacific Division and carrying the look of a team expected to be in the thick of things all season.
For Toronto, the backdrop is different now. Under new head coach Jim Hiller, the Maple Leafs are trying to steady themselves in a crowded Atlantic Division, and any game against a contender already comes with its own pressure. Add Babcocks history with the organization, and this one carries a bit more emotion than a typical regular-season matchup, with the Leafs facing a coach who knows their market well and an Oilers team that has plenty of reasons to treat the night as more than just another stop. [Read more 🡒]
Connor Murphy Is Becoming An Oilers Problem They Can't Ignore
Connor Murphys place in the Oilers blue-line picture is starting to draw more attention than the team probably wants. Edmontons record has kept the focus on bigger-picture success, but Murphys underlying numbers have not matched the clubs standing, and the concern is less about one bad night than a stretch of play that has analysts questioning how much value he is providing at even strength. In a season where the Oilers are trying to stay sharp at the back end, that kind of scrutiny tends to linger.
The wrinkle is that Murphys struggles may not be happening in a vacuum. The second defensive pairing around him has not given Edmonton much support, which makes it harder to separate individual issues from a broader depth problem. With returning players eventually changing the mix and the front office still weighing what the blue line should look like long term, Murphys role could end up depending as much on the teams next move as on his own play. [Read more 🡒]