Lowetide: Why the Oilers’ opening-night roster is short two foundational pieces
Ceci #Ceci
The Edmonton Oilers’ opening-night roster looks like the fastest car in the NHL race. The problem? There’s no insurance.
The club has just 21 men on the 23-man roster and can’t place 12 forwards on the team for the first game.
The roster is razor thin and any injury, as happened during training camp with defenceman Markus Niemelainen, can send the depth chart sideways.
It’s less than optimal cap management, and that things could be tight all year signals multiple headaches for the capologists.
The big issue surrounds key positions on the roster, on defence and in goal.
What can the Oilers do in such an untenable situation? Here’s a look.
Two major holes
The Oilers have two problems: The team is close to the cap, meaning two roster spots can’t be filled. Those two holes on the roster have value.
The bigger worry comes when looking at the feature positions.
The club deploys enormous talents at the top end, and in fact, most of the key foundation positions are well covered.
The most important spots on a roster are the top two lines, top two pairings, No. 3 centre and starting goaltender. Edmonton looks good in all but two of these areas at this time.
Top LinesTop PairingsNo. 3 CentreNo. 1 goalie
Connor McDavid
Darnell Nurse
Ryan McLeod
Leon Draisaitl
Mattias Ekholm
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins
Evan Bouchard
Zach Hyman
Evander Kane
Connor Brown
One of the right side pairings (covered by Cody Ceci a year ago with Philip Broberg possibly pushing this year) and the No. 1 goalie job (candidates are Jack Campbell and Stuart Skinner) should be considered uncertain entering the 2023-24 season.
Ceci had injury problems and was not a strong option on the team’s second pairing during the postseason.
TandemTOI-GameGoal PctX-Goal Pct
Ekholm-Bouchard
14:31
53
53
Nurse-Ceci
12:04
43
46
All numbers five-on-five
Ceci fought injury during the year and his numbers saw a significant drop in the playoffs. His regular season GA-60 (2.64) spiked to 3.23 per 60 during the postseason. His cap hit is $3.25 million and he is signed through the summer of 2025.
Coach Jay Woodcroft has some options, notably Broberg, but a replacement could be found from outside the organization during the season for the No. 2 right side spot. The veteran will have to be better during the regular season in order to maintain his spot among the team’s top defenders.
Edmonton’s goalie tandem posted a .914 save percentage at five-on-five last season (No. 15 among 32 teams) and is shy of championship calibre. The most reasonable scenario has the two incumbents sharing the load. At five-on-five, the preseason numbers looked like this:
PlayerMinutesSave PctGAA
129
0.97
0.93
131
0.902
2.28
Campbell had a strong preseason for the club, but he had a quality run last season during the exhibition schedule, too. Skinner will have plenty of chances during the regular season to re-establish himself as a No. 1 goaltender.
Trades for the two holes on the roster
Edmonton general manager Ken Holland is unlikely to make a move during the heart of the season to shore up the two areas of main concern.
As things get closer to the deadline, there are some names to keep in mind.
Dylan DeMelo plays a key role for the Winnipeg Jets. Puck IQ had him playing the most time on ice (as a percentage of overall) against elites at five-on-five among Winnipeg defencemen last season. His cap hit of $3 million is reasonable and his possession numbers versus elites were strong in 2022-23. His Dangerous Fenwick (smart Corsi or smart expected goals) was 51 percent, easily the best among the Jets’ top-four defenders.
Nick Jensen of the Washington Capitals played over 440 minutes versus elites last year, with a Dangerous Fenwick of 50.4 percent. He’s a little more expensive than DeMelo at $4 million and has more term (free agent in summer of 2026) but would represent an upgrade for the Oilers.
In goal, the candidates will become clear as teams begin to bleed out and fall short of playoff contention.
Campbell’s performance in preseason is encouraging. If he can deliver quality totals for the Oilers, Holland’s job this season will be far less difficult. His career totals at five-on-five over the last several seasons suggest a rebound from last year’s struggles is a reasonable bet.
YearGamesSave PctGAA
2019-20
26
0.918
2.37
2020-21
22
0.928
1.89
2021-22
49
0.917
2.51
2022-23
36
0.896
3.05
For Holland, running Campbell out 30-plus times between now and the trade deadline is a wise idea. If the veteran performs as hoped on the day he was signed, Edmonton need only worry about the Ceci spot at the deadline. If Ceci or Broberg solves that issue during the season, a rare deadline spent tinkering (the first since 2017) might be in order.
The two vacant roster spots
A trade could come early in the season, but is likely to resemble last year’s Klim Kostin acquisition. A depth player to help out the third and fourth lines.
Holland has locked himself in, save a change of heart decision and offloading of Warren Foegele or Brett Kulak.
There may be moments like the Niemelainen injury that force the club to run a skeleton crew.
It’s less than ideal, but with a roster that should dominate the division (along with the Vegas Golden Knights), Holland will wheel at the deadline to make the roster whole.
Is this the best plan?
Edmonton’s roster issues come from slow-playing the long-term contract of Nurse.
This summer, the Evan Bouchard signing continued the trend that has delivered the franchise into cap hell.
Credit to Holland, the free agent dollars have been mostly well spent. If Campbell delivers a strong season, the general manager may count the Campbell deal as a positive.
Prepare for some high-wire roster moves this season in an effort to ice something close to a complete roster of 19 men (plus a backup goalie).
Management has made that chore a burden.
(Photo of Jack Campbell: Ethan Miller / Getty Images)