The Edmonton Oilers have tried time and again to build a skill line capable of competing against elite teams that doesn’t include Connor McDavid or Leon Draisaitl. Based on a mountain of evidence over more than a decade, it doesn’t work.

Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch found a short-term fix in Game 5 of the series against the Anaheim Ducks. He placed centre Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, the defensive conscience of the McDavid line, with veteran wingers Zach Hyman and Vasily Podkolzin in an effort to find a No. 2 outscoring line.

The need arose from the decision to reunite McDavid and Draisaitl on a line. McDavid wasn’t 100 percent, and Draisaitl was just coming back from injury. Together, the two men can be fury, even when playing injured. In the spring of 2022, Draisaitl was suffering from a significant high-ankle sprain but remained in the lineup. At five-on-five solo, his line was outscored 9-1 during the postseason. When playing with McDavid, the line’s goal share was 22-9. The two elite talents can make magic, and that was the goal in making the line shuffle in front of Game 5 in Edmonton.

The man charged with helping McDavid and Draisaitl in Game 5? Finnish winger Kasperi Kapanen, who has been inconsistent during his time in Edmonton but can be effective when playing well. He doesn’t have the two-way ability of Nugent-Hopkins, a fact that would come into play during Game 6 on Thursday night.

It was also a big ask for Podkolzin, who needed to be a big piece on a line without McDavid or Draisaitl. In the first game, Edmonton ran with these two lines as the feature units in Game 5 on Tuesday, and the results were excellent:

PlayerMinsGoalsX-Goal Pct

12

1-0

21

7

2-0

51

All numbers five-on-five, via Natural Stat Trick

The Oilers’ top two lines scored three goals in the game, a major factor in Edmonton getting back in the series with the Game 5 win. Ducks coach Joel Quenneville was hard matching defenceman Jackson Lacombe against the McDavid line at five-on-five. Knoblauch countered in Game 5 by running his two new skill lines. Both ploys worked.

There were other contributions. Staying out of the penalty box allowed the Oilers to play a strong five-on-five game for most of the contest. The defence limited high-danger chances, and goaltender Connor Ingram did a fine job on the shots that got through. The formula held because the Oilers played a disciplined game and were sound defensively. The gaps between forwards and defencemen were reduced, and the forward passes included shorter, quick tape-to-tape attempts and a few stretch passes that are by nature low-percentage plays.

Game 6 crash

The top two lines outscored Anaheim 3-0 in Game 5, but the McDavid line was outshot 7-4 and delivered 21 percent of the expected goals. That came in a home game, and the coaching staff decided to roll it out again on the road in Game 6. That was a key decision.

The pregame involved the usual hockey talk about experience and its value in big games. Hyman was quoted as saying, “A lot of us played in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals. We’ve played in big games before, so there’s a comfort to playing in those. You gotta play your best when your season’s on the line, and I think you’re better at it the more you play.”

The plan only works if the line that houses McDavid and Draisaitl can outscore the opposition. It didn’t happen, and Knoblauch stayed with McDavid-Draisaitl-Kapanen for too long. The Oilers’ only goal in the third period came from the reunited line of Podkolzin, Draisaitl and Kapanen.

What’s next? 

The Oilers are at a crossroads. Owner Daryl Katz has hired three famous general managers (Peter Chiarelli, Ken Holland and Stan Bowman) during the McDavid and Draisaitl era, and there is no Stanley Cup. McDavid’s new two-year contract kicks in this fall, taking him to free agency in the summer of 2028.

The Oilers under Bowman invested in youth this season, with names like Matt Savoie, Ike Howard, Josh Samanski and Colton Dach marbled through the roster. Should the team continue along that path? Or would it be wiser to add veteran help in a final push for Stanley in McDavid’s two remaining contract seasons?

It will come down to ownership’s vision and management’s ability to carry out the plan. Will Edmonton deal for veteran Minnesota Wild goaltender Filip Gustavsson, or a young goalie like Trey Augustine or Sebastian Cossa, who are both Detroit Red Wings prospects? Is there a third option? Sign Ingram and run back the same tandem acquired during the season. Tristan Jarry may perform better given a full training camp with the team.

Should Edmonton elevate Howard, the impressive goal-scoring winger who spent large portions of the season in the AHL with the Bakersfield Condors? He could perhaps fetch a valuable player in a trade leading up to the draft.

It may be time to move on from Darnell Nurse. His no-movement deal remains intact for another year, but there may be an appetite from both sides to move on.

Bowman will likely remain as general manager, but what about the coaching staff? Knoblauch signed a three-year extension that kicks in this fall, and it’s rare to see a team walk a coach under those circumstances. The disappointment is real, but there has to be some acknowledgement that this team is worn out from three years of hard hockey. The fact that the Oilers don’t have a championship doesn’t alter the enormous workload endured by this team since the fall of 2023.

First-blush predictions

The organization will make some big changes over the summer, but I suspect Knoblauch returns as head coach. His support staff will include a veteran coach who could step in immediately if things go off the rails during the regular season. Paul Coffey returns to his role as special adviser, but this time the job has more power, and he emerges as a more influential member of hockey operations. It’s possible that Coffey is the next general manager of the Oilers, but it won’t be next season.

Expect the team to tweak in net. A deal with the Wild makes the most sense, but there are other teams with two goalies worthy of starting roles, and Bowman must seek a strong option in net and then fully commit to that player. Nurse might be part of a package for a goalie, or he could be used to acquire a veteran goal-scorer to replace Jack Roslovic. Several wingers, including Roslovic, disappointed during the Anaheim series.

The hard truth

This is an aging team. Also, the heart of the order, including McDavid, Draisaitl and Evan Bouchard, are not strong defensively, and that’s a factor in what we’ve seen over the last decade. There appears to be no real maturation in attention to detail defensively at the top of this roster.

Nugent-Hopkins is the defensive conscience of this team, but he’s now 33. The best candidate to replace him is Savoie. The Oilers badly need to find more two-way types to deal with talented teams like the Ducks.

While the Oilers were pushing for the Stanley Cup and trading away their future assets in that pursuit, young players were developing elsewhere and finding their way to the NHL. Some of those damn good young players in Anaheim just beat the Oilers in six.

What’s sad about these Oilers is that they’ve grown old without winning a damn thing. That’s a hard pill to swallow, but it’s the truth.