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After presenting as one of the very top teams in the NHL for the three-month period November through January, the Edmonton Oilers hit the skids in February. They spent the better part of March finding their A game, only to hit a new wall with the injuries to superstars Leon Draisaitl and Connor McDavid in consecutive games. Both occurred on innocuous plays, but the outcomes were significant in the short and possibly intermediate term.
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The supporting cast did find a way to win their first game without both of their top guns, which by happenstance was Game #70. The club has now completed seven 10-game segments in 2024-25, so it’s again time to review the most recent trends against the backdrop of the bigger picture.
Games 1 –10: 4-5-1, .450 | 22 GF, 35 GA | 343 SF, 261 SA | .930 PDO
Games 11-20: 6-3-1, .650 | 33 GF, 27 GA | 318 SF, 249 SA | .995 PDO
Games 21-30: 8-2-0, .800 | 42 GF, 22 GA | 314 SF, 281 SA | 1.055 PDO
Games 31-40: 7-2-1, .750 | 35 GF, 25 GA | 304 SF, 258 SA | 1.018 PDO
Games 41-50: 7-3-0, .700 | 34 GF, 26 GA | 317 SF, 273 SA | 1.012 PDO
Games 51-60: 3-6-1, .350 | 29 GF, 38 GA | 324 SF, 323 SA | .972 PDO
Games 61-70: 6-3-1, .650 | 34 GF, 29 GA | 315 SF, 252 SA | .993 PDO
In the most recent 10-game segment, the Oilers re-assumed control of the flow of play, logging 56% of the shots on goal outshooting their combined opposition by over 6 shots per game. Their goal share was a little below that at 54%, the shortfall reflected by their PDO (combined shooting and save percentage) which was a little south of the break even point of 1.000.
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Were Edmonton’s goalies inferior, or was the team allowing a higher share of the most dangerous shots? Data collected by video analysis here at the Cult of Hockey suggests it may have been more of the latter. Our data shows that in Games 61-70 the Oilers produced 163 Grade A shots to just 132 for their opponents, a solid 55%. But in the most dangerous, 5-alarm shots, the Oil were below the breakeven mark for the first time in memory. It was as close as could be, 65 for, 66 against for a share of 49.6%, but well off the season-to-date pace which had itself been in the 55% range through 60 games.
At 5v5 the shortfall was slightly greater at 50 for, 55 against for a shade below 48%.
Overall, a welcome bounceback from the preceding 10 games which were awful. And the first 5 games of the most recent set weren’t a whole lot better at 2-3-0, before a 4-0-1 run to close it out and return to some semblance of normalcy.
Indeed, it’s instructive to subdivide Edmonton’s season to date into “half segments” of 5 games.
The green line represents the league average points percentage of .550, which provides a useful over/under line for success in any given set of games. 5 points in 5 games will simply not keep pace with the league as a whole.
The trend line is clear enough, and matches what any Oilers fan might say about the 2024-25 campaign: sluggish start, then an extended period of sustained excellence, followed by a crash to the worst run of the season. The very last data point is a positive sign, but it will be tough to consolidate given the ongoing absences of the squad’s two defining players.
We turn now to individual results, starting as always with the goaltenders. Kris Knoblauch continued his season-long plan of 2 starts for Stu Skinner to every 1 for Calvin Pickard. In the segment just past the duo shared a pair of games, with Pickard getting yanked by his coach against Anaheim while Skinner got pulled by the concussion spotter vs. Winnipeg.
Skinner continued to get the tougher opponents for the most part and thus a higher share of expected goals against and a correspondingly lower expected save percentage, as per sources like Clear Sight Analytics. That said, .879 over any stretch of games is not great.
Evan Bouchard doesn’t get a lot of love in Oil Country these days, but there’s no denying he continues to put up the offensive numbers. In the segment just past he led the d corps in goals, assists, points, shots and shooting percentage, even as exasperating defensive miscues continued to crop up on a too-frequent basis.
Mattias Ekholm also posted excellent boxcars, especially notable given he played just 4 of the 10 games. Top minute-muncher Darnell Nurse raised his game at the offensive end of the sheet while trade deadline prize Jake Walman was generally impressive as Nurse’s new partner. The third pairing had its hands full keeping the puck out of Oilers’ net, especially Ty Emberson who posted a team-worst minus-6 in 7 games before finding himself on the outside looking in.
For the first time all season, five-time scoring champ Connor McDavid was alone in first place as Edmonton’s scoring leader for the segment with 15 points in 9 games. His +8 was a very strong answer to the ghastly -12 of the prior 10-game set. Things seemed to be going his way until injury struck.
It was another strong segment for Leon Draisaitl who was cruising along at his season-long rate of 1.5 points per game until he got banged up in a weird collision against the Coyotes.
A 10-game segment with double digit points is old hat for those two. Very nice to see Ryan Nugent-Hopkins rejoin that club, which he did in a rush by scoring 9 points over his last 4 games. No surprise to see Zach Hyman round out the top 4, pounding home 5 goals while leading the team in shots.
Alas, it’s also no surprise to see a major gap between #4 and #5 on this list. No Oiler forward outside of those on the first powerplay unit scored more than 3 points, though a couple of them were heating up towards the end of the segment. Most notable among them was Jeff Skinner who potted 3 goals in the last 2 games to end a lengthy dry spell.
We close in our usual fashion by reviewing the set of 10 games through the lens of our own subjective ratings here at the Cult of Hockey. Regular readers will know that we grade on a scale of 1 to 10, the performance of every Edmonton Oilers player in every game the team plays, based on a combination of observation and interpretation of statistical output. Here are average grades for Games 61-70 along with our customary thumbnail comment summarizing each player’s contribution over that span.
Results by grader, seventh segment:
STAPLES: John Klingberg close to return, does he have more to give?
STAPLES: Don Cherry holds forth on injuries to McDavid, Draisaitl
LEAVINS: 9 Things, Mar 23 edition
McCURDY: Player grades from 5-4 win over Kraken
McCURDY: Without McDavid, Draisaitl, Oilers enter uncharted waters
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