{"id":543109,"date":"2026-03-17T21:14:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T21:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/543109\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T21:14:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T21:14:08","slug":"without-draisaitl-well-soon-find-out-what-oilers-are-made-of","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/543109\/","title":{"rendered":"Without Draisaitl, we\u2019ll soon find out what Oilers are made of"},"content":{"rendered":"

EDMONTON \u2014\u00a0So, let\u2019s see what these Edmonton Oilers<\/a> have. Who this year\u2019s Edmonton Oilers really are.<\/p>\n

If they\u2019re good enough to survive the next five weeks without Leon Draisaitl<\/a>, their top faceoff man and sniper, maybe they\u2019re good enough to be a Stanley Cup contender once again.<\/p>\n

But, if losing Draisaitl for the rest of the regular season with a \u201clower body injury\u201d (believed to be a knee) is too much, then to be honest, they probably weren\u2019t going to be champions anyhow. And that\u2019s all that matters anymore, here in \u201cCup or Bust-ville, Alberta.”<\/p>\n

\u201cThe one thing that is going to be most important is checking. Playing that stingy game,\u201d said Ryan Nugent-Hopkins<\/a>. \u201cYou probably lose a little bit of the scoring, but you\u2019ve got to check your way to finding those opportunities.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a huge piece of this team. We\u2019ve got to find ways to win games without him.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Oilers are the only team in hockey that enjoys the luxury of two top-three or four scorers in their lineup every night during the Connor McDavid<\/a> and Leon Draisaitl era.<\/p>\n

Now they have one, to which pretty much every other team would say, \u201cBoo hoo\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Like 31 other teams, the loss of Draisaitl makes Edmonton less reliant on two superstars and a world-class power play, and more dependent on solid defensive play and (gulp!) goaltending.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a Top 4 scorer \u2014 one of the most elite players in the league. It\u2019s not like just one guy can step into his shoes,\u201d Nugent-Hopkins said, after the morning skate, but before the Draisaitl news had been released by the team. \u201cWe (the Oilers players) talked about it this morning: it\u2019s a collective thing. Everybody is going to have to pick up a bit of the slack.\u201d<\/p>\n

So, what do the Oilers lose in this exquisite shooter, world-class faceoff man, a player who plays through injury and delivers his best when the games mean the most?<\/p>\n

\u2022 Draisaitl is the NHL\u2019s second leading scorer over the past eight years, behind only McDavid.<\/p>\n

\u2022 He has scored 50 goals and 100 points four times in the past eight seasons. More times than any other player.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Draisaitl\u2019s 172 power-play goals over the past decade place him first \u2014\u00a0a distant 37 goals ahead of Alex Ovechkin. As such, Edmonton\u2019s power play is tops in the NHL this season, and tops over the past decade.<\/p>\n

So, although it\u2019s a serious blow to the Oilers team construct to lose their\u00a0second-line centre\u00a0\u2014\u00a0not to mention the \u201cnuclear option\u201d of playing the two superstars on the same line \u2014\u00a0in reality, they\u2019re still no worse off than anyone else when it comes to high-end talent.<\/p>\n

\u201cFive-on-five, you don’t have one of the best players on the ice playing 20-24 minutes a night. It’s really important that our team simplifies our game,\u201d head coach Kris Knoblauch said. \u201cWe’re not going to be able to score as many goals; we can’t outscore our troubles. So it’s going to be important that we play good defensive hockey.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still in a fight to qualify for the 2026 post-season, the Oilers will have to learn to succeed the way 31 other teams do \u2014\u00a0with a 20-man team effort and a balanced attack that gets goals from everywhere.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t fill the void,\u201d McDavid said of losing his buddy to injury. \u201cIt\u2019s the old clich\u00e9: Everyone is going to have to be better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Captain Obvious says, there is no positive spin to losing a player as valuable as Draisaitl. But perhaps there is an opportunity here, a chance to piece together a late-season game that can put Edmonton in good position when the playoffs start.<\/p>\n

Down the middle, Knoblauch still has McDavid at 1C, now Jason Dickinson<\/a> at 2C, young Josh Samanski at 3C and veteran Adam Henrique centring his fourth line. Nugent-Hopkins, a 1,000-game NHL centreman, will play left wing next to Dickinson tonight against San Jose but is available to move into the middle at any time.<\/p>\n

For months now, this team has spoken about getting its goals against down, defending like a successful NHL team defends, and drawing on all the lessons that come with having played in 13 playoff series over the past four springs.<\/p>\n

Now, it\u2019s time to deliver \u2014\u00a0without one of their leaders.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got lots of guys in here that can lead. Lots of different guys who have a voice in here,\u201d said McDavid, standing inside the Edmonton dressing room on Monday. \u201cObviously, he’s got a big one, (but) if he’s not playing for a little bit \u2026 it doesn’t matter.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need leaders at this time of year, and we need our group to be lively and energetic. That\u2019s with or without him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EDMONTON \u2014\u00a0So, let\u2019s see what these Edmonton Oilers have. Who this year\u2019s Edmonton Oilers really are. If they\u2019re…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":348948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194294],"tags":[49,48,23752],"class_list":{"0":"post-543109","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edmonton","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-edmonton"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=543109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543109\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/348948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=543109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=543109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=543109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}