Connor McDavid is slated to skate with a familiar offensive duo while Leon Draisaitl will line up with two of the newest Edmonton Oilers hired guns Wednesday night at Rogers Place to open their National Hockey League (NHL) season.
The star centres, playing their ninth and 10th campaigns in Edmonton, led the Oilers to the Stanley Cup Final in June, bowing to the eventual NHL champion Florida Panthers in seven games.
Zach Hyman, who scored 54 goals last season playing primarily with No. 97, and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, who recorded 104 points two seasons ago, will play wing alongside McDavid, who won the Conn Smythe Trophy as NHL playoffs MVP.
Newcomers Jeff Skinner and Viktor Arvidsson, who both signed with Edmonton on July 1 as free agents, will skate on a line with Draisaitl when the Oilers host the Winnipeg Jets starting at 8 p.m.
Skinner, a 14-year veteran who came to the Oilers from the Buffalo Sabres, scored 24 goals last year, and has recorded 30-plus goals five times and reached the 40-goal plateau five years ago.
Arvidsson joined the Oilers from the Pacific Division-rival Los Angeles Kings, with whom he scored 15 points in 18 games over an injury-plagued campaign in 2023-24 but had notched 26 goals and 33 assists two seasons ago.
Draisaitl, meanwhile, signed an eight-year contract extension in August to extend his already relatively lengthy – and successful – stay in Edmonton. The 28-year-old recorded his fifth 100-plus point season over the last six NHL campaigns in 2023-24.
Mattias Janmark had skated on Draisaitl’s left wing in place of Skinner earlier this week, but Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch told media Wednesday after the team’s morning skate that Skinner would be in that spot to start against the Jets.
Another forward newcomer, Vasily Podkolzin, will play left wing on the fourth line, while off-season additions Ty Emberson and Travis Dermott will make their regular-season debuts in blue and orange on the blueline.
“We’ve made a big transition, especially on the right side defence, and then also the forwards, losing some key guys that were part of it last year, but the guys that we feel are taking ownership or moving into those roles are really excited about it,” Knoblauch said after the morning skate.
“We’ve got other guys that we could rely on that (penalty) killed last year a little bit for us in a secondary role, and right now, with the guys (and) how they performed – Arvidsson, Podkolzin – those two being new players into the mix, I think they’ve done really well, and we’ve got backups that we can use, but right now, I don’t think we have to go to that.”
Nugent-Hopkins said a commitment to good defence – their “mindset for the past few years” – by the Oilers needs to continue if they hope to take a run at the Stanley Cup Final again.
“That’s why we’ve had some success,” Nugent-Hopkins told media.
“It’s defence first and then offence kind of leads from there, but not just defending in our zone. It’s the way that we backtrack and forecheck, get pucks back and work away from the puck that kind of dictates all that stuff.”
Forward
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins • Connor McDavid • Zach Hyman
Jeff Skinner • Leon Draisaitl • Viktor Arvidsson
Mattias Janmark • Adam Henrique • Connor Brown
Vasily Podkolzin • Derek Ryan • Corey Perry
Defence
Mattias Ekholm • Evan Bouchard
Darnell Nurse • Ty Emberson
Brett Kulak • Travis Dermott
Goal
Stuart Skinner • Calvin Pickard
Lavoie reclaimed from Vegas
The Oilers reclaimed forward Raphael Lavoie on Wednesday after the Vegas Golden Knights, who had initially plucked the 24-year-old prospect off the waiver wire on Monday from Edmonton, put him back onto waivers the next day.
Lavoie cleared waivers but only because the Oilers were the lowest-seeded team of the two that put a claim on him Wednesday. That means one of the eight NHL teams that finished ahead of the Oilers in the standings last season – either the Jets, Panthers, Colorado Avalanche, Boston Bruins, Vancouver Canucks, Carolina Hurricanes, Dallas Stars or New York Rangers – also tried to add him to their roster.
That move means Lavoie would have to clear waivers again in order for the Oilers to reassign him to their minor-league affiliate in Bakersfield, Calif.
Meanwhile in Seattle
Philip Broberg is on pace for an 82-goal season and Dylan Holloway skated on the winning team’s top forward line as the St. Louis Blues beat the host Seattle Kraken Tuesday in the first NHL game of the regular season.
The afternoon affair marked the Blues’ debuts of both defenceman Broberg and winger Holloway, who were poached by St. Louis from the Edmonton Oilers in August via restricted free-agent offer sheets.
Broberg, skating on a defensive pairing with Justin Faulk, scored in the second period to tie the game 2-2. Holloway, who notched an assist on his fellow former Oiler’s goal, recorded 16:01 of ice time, Broberg 20:23.