Oilers rightly optimistic they can pull themselves into NHL playoff picture. Again

Edmonton Oilers teammates Darnell Nurse (25) and Connor McDavid (97) celebrate an overtime win over the visiting Nashville Predators on Nov. 14, 2024. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press)

Hockey fans know the adage: U.S. Thanksgiving, while unofficial, serves as a great calendar marker in predicting which teams will make the National Hockey League playoffs.

The date on the calendar is roughly the quarter-pole of the NHL regular season, and since 2005-06 – the first season after the one lost to a lockout – of the 256 teams in a playoff position at the American national holiday, 197 went on to advance to the post-season (not including the COVID-affected 2019-20 and 2020-21 campaigns.)

That's 76.9 per cent of them, a great indicator.

If you're an Edmonton Oilers fan, that's bad news. Kind of.

The Oilers, who start a three-game road-trip Friday in Utah, sit one point out of a wild-card playoff spot on Thursday. That won't change by Friday morning as there are no NHL games scheduled the day before, very likely because the National Football League's traditional turkey-day tilts draws most (OK, all) the oxygen from the sports-viewer calendar.

Oilers star Leon Draisaitl isn't daunted by the spot his team is in.

"We're in a fine position – not exactly where we want to be, but we're certainly in striking distance of where we want to be," Draisaitl told media after practice on Thursday.

"It's just a matter of stringing (wins) together a little bit, finding a couple of win streaks that last a little longer than two games. That's our plan. That's what we're looking to do."

Draisaitl, the team's leading scorer, has good reason to be confident.

The Oilers have recently bucked the Thanksgiving law of averages, just last year and the year before.

But while Edmonton is now in the same position it was two years ago at U.S. Thanksgiving – just barely out of the post-season picture; in fact, they were tied with three other teams for the last wild-card spot in the Western Conference in 2022 – last year was looking much, much worse.

Oilers fans definitely recall that dark time 12 months ago. Their favourite team was trawling the depths of the NHL standings, a full 10 points out of a playoff spot in the West and looking like they were going to be fighting the San Jose Sharks and the Chicago Blackhawks, the league's two worst teams last season, in the Macklin Celebrini sweepstakes (a.k.a. the first overall pick in the 2024 NHL Draft.)

Two weeks before, the Oilers had hit rock bottom by losing to the Sharks – who went on to finish last and claim that No. 1 selection – and briefly becoming co-owners of the NHL's most-putrid record with them.

It was a loss that was the final straw for head coach Jay Woodcroft and his assistant Dave Manson, who were fired three days later.

By U.S. Thanksgiving last year, the Oilers had gone 2-3 under new bench boss Kris Knoblauch. As mentioned, they were 10 points out of a wild-card spot.

But then they started winning.

They began an eight-game winning streak the next day. By Dec. 12, the Oilers had pulled themselves up the standings to sit one point back of the playoff picture.

The Oilers followed that with a three-game skid, but then the real miracle occurred: A 16-game win streak that went on for a month and a half and launched them into the upper reaches of the table.

By the time they lost to the Vegas Golden Knights on Feb. 6, they had gone 26-6 under Knoblauch, goalie Stuart Skinner had won 12 starts in a row, stars Connor McDavid and Draisaitl had recorded 26 and 23 points, respectively, and forward Zach Hyman had scored 12 goals en route to his team-best 54 on the season.

By the time the dust settled, the Oilers finished the regular season second in the Pacific Division and in a playoff spot.

And, oh yeah, they ended up going all the way to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup final.

Run your memory back to the end of the 2022-23 season, and the Oilers also made the playoffs before eventually bowing out in the second round of the post-season.

All that to say, yes, even though the odds are against them, the Oilers are able to overcome them. This group has proven that.

And besides, Oilers players both last season and this have said without that early adversity a year ago – as daunting as it looked – perhaps the team doesn't end up performing as it did going 43-18-5 following their vexing start.

"I look back at last year (and) I'm not sure we go on that run without that start, just because you learn so much about yourself," Oilers defenceman Mattias Ekholm told media on Tuesday.

"I'm not saying I wouldn't have loved to start like Winnipeg (currently 18-5 and tops in the NHL standings), but at the same time, going through these things early rather than go on a hot streak for six months then the last month of the season before the playoffs, you're starting to struggle, you don't really know, 'Oh, what do we do now?' But last year, I thought we went through every bit of adversity that we could. We learned a lot about each other and what we needed to do as a group to be successful.

"Hopefully, this is that time for this group."

What's going right

The Oilers are two games over .500 with an 11-9-2 record, so they're well ahead of where they were a year ago when they were 5-12-1 before their eight-game winning tear.

What's not

The injured Hyman said Thursday that consistency is something every NHL team struggles with at times.

"Everybody goes out there and (tries) to make the right play and do all the right things," said Hyman, who's been out of the Oilers' lineup after suffering an injury Nov. 19 in Ottawa and hopes to return during the team's upcoming road trip. "When things are going in, it's probably easier to be consistent because the little things, the little mistakes, go unnoticed, but for our group, I think there are times where we play really well, and five-on-five, actually, we've been pretty good this year.

"The puck hasn't necessarily gone in for us at the same rate that we're used to, but I think we've been pretty solid. I think on special teams, we're starting to come and there's a lot of room for improvement there."

Draisaitl said he and his teammates can do more to support Skinner.

"There have been lots of games where we haven't been at our best for him, and then nobody looks good, especially on the stats side of things," Draisaitl said.

"I think for him, it's just about playing. He just needs to play and do what he does. He's very capable of being a starting goalie, and we've seen it. He's done it before. He's shown it before. Just drop some of the baggage that comes with the pressure, or the talk from the outside. He's a good goalie, and he's our guy."

Knoblauch told media after practice on Thursday "a lot of" what's contributing to Hyman's scoring woes, in particular, is the ineffectiveness of the Oilers' power play, that because "the puck's not getting there for him," he's not scoring nearly as much.

Of Hyman's team-leading 54 goals last season, 15 came on the power play. Two seasons ago, he also scored 15 goals on the power play out of his 36 lamp-lighters overall.

"Everything else has to go around him," Knoblauch said. "He's the last guy that touches the puck. He's the one that scores it. Last year, things were going very well, which he benefits from."