The Oilers continue to do themselves a total of zero favors and are once more falling is the standings as other teams rise. Currently the Oilers find themselves outside of a Wild Card position. While the Oilers have been one of the best 5 on 5 teams in the NHL under Jay Woodcroft they have had one of the worst special teams records.

With the likes of Draisaitl and McDavid on the top unit, you would expect at bare minimum for this group to be above average yet they have one of the worst PP% since January. Too often this group looks static and is waiting for that perfect pass to Draisaitl instead of moving their feet and creating more chances. Blame has to fall on the new head coach for this aspect of the game but also to assistant coach Glen Gulutzan who is in charge of special teams.

The players themselves need to be better of course. Edmonton has looked down right sloppy ever since returning from their Florida trip. The defense in particular, led by Darnell Nurse has been the cause of many a mistake.

Unsurprisingly, news around social media was that Islanders goaltender, Semyon, Varlamov has stated he would not accept a trade to Edmonton. The 33 year old goaltender has one year remaining on his salary at 5 million. Right now Edmonton is once again not looking like a place that many free agents want to go. This is a team that should be competing for Cups but instead is trying to maybe make it into the playoffs.

There are a few teams in the League that deserve some attention right now; the Calgary Flames, LA Kings, and to a lesser degree Dallas Stars are all teams that have quickly turned their fortunes around. None of these teams went through a lengthy 5+ year rebuild, nor did any of these teams draft a generational talent/another elite player. Instead these teams looked at their roster deficiencies, trusted analytics and modern results, and made a few astute trades and UFA signings to get where they are today.

Hot take; drafting Connor McDavid may have hurt the Oilers long term chances at winning a Cup. It allowed this organization to be far too mediocre for far too long believing that the "Golden Goose" would be enough. If the Oilers miss the playoffs again, Ken Holland will likely be fired and once more this team will need to suffer for a couple years to get rid of bad cap space.

Duncan Keith - H
Devin Shore - H
Mikko Koskinen - C
Zack Kassian - H
Kyle Turris - H
Mike Smith - H
Tyson Barrie - H

That represents a total of 22.4 million dollars. Can you imagine how good this team currently could be if they had 22.4 million dollars to spend elsewhere? Only Koskinen's contract came from the prior GM and ironically, Koskinen might be the only name here somewhat helping the team. The remainder of these contracts are all on Holland and aside from Turris, will all be counting against the cap next season as well.

Tonight the Oilers are in a must win situation against the Caps. Until this team gains some traction again and puts themselves back comfortably in a playoff spot, every game needs to be viewed as a must win game.

One last quick thought. Tonight Alexander Ovechkin has a chance to take sole possession of the third all time goal scoring leader of the NHL after tying Jaromir Jagr last night. I wouldn't be surprised to see him do it.

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