On February 28, 2023, Edmonton Oilers general manager Ken Holland speaks with the media in the Hall of Fame room at Rogers Place about the trade that sent Jesse Puljujarvi to Carolina. PHOTO: SHAUGHN BUTTS/Postmedia
Article content.
Nobody needs to convince the Edmonton Oilers that being a contender requires more than just luck.
While 11 of the last 15 champions were draft lottery winners (though Erik Johnson had nothing to do with the St. Louis Blues’ 2019 Cup run) and three others (L.A. twice and Boston) had a second overall pick in their lineup, no one understands better than Edmonton that even a draft lottery dynasty cannot propel you to the top.
Winning four first-round picks and seven other top-10 picks in 13 years wasn’t nearly enough. It took forever, but the Oilers are here because they eventually made the big moves and struck a few smaller, craftier trades to fill out the squad.
And Ken Holland, despite his flaws, made it happen.
You might reasonably criticize him for placing the Oilers in a cap crunch and for transactions such as Sam Gagner and two second-round selections for nine games of Andreas Athanasiou or $5 million for Jack Campbell, but he also made two of the best trades in recent Oilers history.
Signing Zach Hyman and exchanging for Mattias Ekholm resulted in grand slams. Without those two players, Edmonton isn’t even a contender.
Hyman is an offensive workhorse who well outperforms the $5.5 million contract that scared off Toronto and sparked initial criticism in the summer of 2021. His 52 goals this year, and 115 in 227 games in Edmonton, have completely silenced the critics.
And Ekholm is the most effective defensive addition since Chris Pronger. He’s big, physical, a tough defender, a stabilizing presence, and a dependable offensive contributor. He has scored 40 points or more in every year in which he has played at least 70 games (with the exception of 34 points in 2017) and is one point shy of 40 this season.
He does it all, even transforming Evan Bouchard into an infinitely better player.
If the Oilers win the championship this season, those two trades will play a significant role.
A little farther down the transaction food chain, here are four more changes that could have a significant impact this spring.
Evander Kane was a risky signing (and re-signing), but he hit the ground running in Edmonton, scoring 22 goals in 43 games and 13 more in three rounds of the playoffs, all while adding physicality, gamesmanship, and making the Oilers a much, much more difficult team to beat.
Holland took a chance and it paid off handsomely.
Things are currently cooling off offensively, which means they are frozen solid. He has zero goals in his previous 20 games and has spent the majority of the last few weeks on the third line.
But you have a feeling his best work this season is on the way. He can be an incredible force out there, and in a seven-game series against a team that likes to get rough, you’ll be glad he’s on your side.
With Corey Perry, you get what you see, unless you’re a referee, in which case you’ll miss a lot of what he does for a team. He’s another player who will likely make an impact in the postseason. Perry is a wily veteran who has seen and done it all in this game, and while his legs aren’t as strong as they once were, he can still navigate his way around a game just well for the job they’ve assigned him.
Connor Brown seemed like a catastrophic mistake, going 63 games without a goal and dropping from Connor McDavid’s side to the fourth line so quickly that Jesse Puljujarvi cringed.
And, with this year’s $3.25 million bonus already on the books for the following season, he appeared to be a perpetual mistake.
But, with three goals and two assists in eight games, he’s feeling it at the perfect time.
Adam Henrique didn’t show much while adjusting to his new surroundings, recording just one assist in five games. It couldn’t have been easy to go from the easygoing loss in Anaheim to the high-pressure, high-stakes game in Edmonton.
But, like Brown, he’s on fire with four goals in the last eight games and is a flexible player that coach Kris Knoblauch can shift around the lineup.
If those four players are on fire in the playoffs, buckle up; it might be a long haul.
