With their place in the standings all but secured, it’s time for the Edmonton Oilers to focus solely on the playoffs to try to correct what can only be described as a disappointing season to date.
The Oilers dropped a 3-0 decision to the Los Angeles Kings on Saturday, a critical loss in a likely battle between the two teams for home-ice advantage in their seemingly annual first-round matchup.
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The Oilers are now four points behind the Kings for second in the Pacific Division with six games remaining for each team. Really, that deficit is five points because the Oilers don’t have the tiebreaker thanks to their measly 32 regulation wins, second-fewest among Western Conference playoff teams.
Even if the Oilers beat the Kings at home in the penultimate game of the regular season, all that’ll do is get them back to level terms from before puck drop on Saturday. And that’s if there’s enough time for that game to even matter.
Win streak snapped 🙁 We’ll wrap up the road trip Monday in Anaheim.@SentinelStorage | #LetsGoOilers pic.twitter.com/l1qAFdA1r7
— Edmonton Oilers (@EdmontonOilers) April 5, 2025
It’s all but a done deal that the Oilers will start the postseason on the road for the first time since Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl joined the team. It just depends on whether they face the Kings or the Vegas Golden Knights for the top spot.
It’s not a position anyone would have expected them to be in entering the campaign, let alone a little more than two months ago.
The defending Western Conference champions were the Presidents’ Trophy favourites after hockey operations CEO and acting GM Jeff Jackson went on a July 1 shopping spree and maintained that status during training camp. Save for an 0-3 start, they played like contenders for the first 50 games as they boasted a .670 points percentage – third behind Washington and Winnipeg.
The last 26 games, including Saturday’s defeat in Southern California, have mostly been poor. The Oilers have won just 12 times since Jan. 30, leaving them in sixth place in the conference with the St. Louis Blues hot on their trail.
Injuries have played a sizable role in the Oilers’ downfall.
They competed in their seventh straight game without McDavid, who’s dealing with a lower-body injury. Leon Draisaitl sat out for the fifth time since March 20 and first time since he left the ice midway through Thursday’s contest in San Jose. Neither is expected to suit up Monday in Anaheim. The Oilers fell to 1-3 without both players in the lineup.
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Saturday also represented their fifth straight game without Mattias Ekholm, arguably their top defenceman. Whether there’s a direct link or it’s purely coincidental, Ekholm’s health issues almost line up perfectly with the Oilers’ decline.
Ekholm was sick before the 4 Nations Face-Off in February and even sat out a game before the tournament. He played through illness during the international event. He then sustained a lower-body injury with the Oilers and tried to gut it out before skipping six games in March. He managed to play four contests before needing more recovery time.
Ekholm up to 12 games missed and counting.
Starting goaltender Stuart Skinner hasn’t been available for the last five games because of a head injury, whereas depth blueliner John Klingberg has mostly been out of commission for a month. None of that has helped the Oilers’ cause.
The tumble down the standings means the Oilers should start away from home and probably might not be considered favourites in the opening road — never mind the rest of the playoffs.
That shouldn’t matter much to this group, even though it’s concerning to face the Kings with the best home record in the league (29-4-4) or having to go into Las Vegas.
The Oilers are the oldest team in the NHL and among the most experienced. Only the Florida Panthers have appeared in more series than Edmonton’s nine in the last three years. This team’s core has seen it all and has had to weather every springtime scenario since they’ve transitioned to contenders.
As Ekholm told The Athletic, getting healthy is the top priority for the Oilers. They have two weeks to go before the playoffs start, so time is ticking. But Saturday’s result means there’s no reason to rush players back for a regular-season matchup until they’re ready or they feel they absolutely need a tune-up before the real action begins.
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That goes for Trent Frederic, too. Frederic made his Oilers debut against the Kings and showed lots of moxie. He had two hits and two shots.
However, coach Kris Knoblauch told reporters in Los Angeles that Frederic needed to be re-evaluated after his first shift. The winger played just 7:10 and only two shifts in the third period. He didn’t see the ice for the last 15 minutes of the game and didn’t always look comfortable in his first action since Feb. 25 after suffering a high-ankle sprain with Boston.
Knoblauch was vague about Frederic’s status for Monday in Anaheim, but said caution will be exercised if needed.
It would be helpful to get Frederic into more games and figure out where he best fits in the lineup. There’s a ton of value in that. Ensuring he’s at his best physically ahead of the playoffs is most important, though.
Putting an emphasis on rest and recovery instead of pushing for better positioning is where the Oilers are at now. It’s not ideal, but the Oilers at least can make the best of it.
That could set them up for their best chance at postseason success, the only way to possibly correct all that’s happened over the last few weeks to leave them in this precarious state.
(Photo: Robert Hanashiro / Imagn Images)
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