Will the real Edmonton Oilers please stand up, please stand up? The team that nobody could figure out is up next in our 30 Teams in 30 Days series.
Team Name: Edmonton Oilers
Record: 19-22-7, 3rd Northwest, no playoffs
Player of the Season: Taylor Hall led the team with 16-34–50 and 14 power-play points. March was a great month with eight goals and nine assists for Hall. He showed he has the talent to lead the team and is a must-start fantasy player despite being 21 and having two years in the league.
Breakout of the Season: Nail Yakupov finished with a nice 17-14–31 line with 10 points on the power play. The rookie was on fire in April with 11 goals and four assists in the final month including six goals in the final three games of the season. The downside is that he went through a run in February and March with two goals in 26 games. Overall, he was a breakout but he was streakier than a poorly-cleaned window.
Disappointment of the Season: Ryan Nugent-Hopkins was expected to put out another solid season like his rookie campaign (18-34–52; 23 points on the power play). Instead he missed eight games with injury and scored just four goals on the season. His first 18 games were a disaster with one goal and six assists through the end of February. His ten assists in March helped keep him from being waiver-wire fodder but he disappointed this season. Look for RNH to be a bounce-back candidate in 2014.
Team Analysis: This team was in the top ten on the power play (20.1%- 7th) and penalty kill (83.4%-9th) and yet didn’t make the playoffs.
The curling trip killed them as did a stretch in April. When Rexall Place was hosting the Canadian National Curling Championships, the Oilers were forced out on the road and picked up six out of 18 possible points in a 2-5-2 trip.
The month of April was puzzling for this team. They were 14-13-7 going into the month and throttled Calgary by a combined 12-3 score in two games to open April. Then they won just one of their next ten games, over lowly Colorado, and scored a total of 13 goals in that span. True to head-scratching form they blew away Minnesota and Vancouver in their final two games by a 12-3 combined score.
I can’t explain it either but those two segments of the season are how a team that good on special teams wound up sitting at home in May.
2013-2014 Story Lines: Who will be between the pipes for this team? Nikolai Khabibulin’s contract is up and Devan Dubnyk was mediocre at best but it’s just like everything else on this team. Dubnyk was 14-16 -6 with a 2.57 GAA and .920 save percentage with two shutouts. He gave up six to Nashville but then shutout Colorado in his next start four days later. Go figure. The other storyline is how much more will the kids come together and can they become consistent enough to be a force in the Western Conference?
2013-2014 Fantasy Guys to Have: Hall, Sam Gagner, Jordan Eberle, Yakupov, Justin Schultz and Nugent-Hopkins
Guys On The Fringe: The team’s starting goaltender (still to be named), Ryan Whitney and Nick Schultz
| PLAYER | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | ATOI | PPG | PPA | SHG | SHA | SOG | SPCT |
| Taylor Hall, LW | 45 | 16 | 34 | 50 | 5 | 33 | 18:37 | 4 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 154 | 10.4 |
| Sam Gagner, C | 48 | 14 | 24 | 38 | -6 | 23 | 19:25 | 4 | 11 | 0 | 2 | 113 | 12.4 |
| Jordan Eberle, C | 48 | 16 | 21 | 37 | -4 | 16 | 19:00 | 3 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 133 | 12.0 |
| Nail Yakupov, RW | 48 | 17 | 14 | 31 | -4 | 24 | 14:34 | 6 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 81 | 21.0 |
| Justin Schultz, D | 48 | 8 | 19 | 27 | -17 | 8 | 21:27 | 4 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 85 | 9.4 |
| Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, C | 40 | 4 | 20 | 24 | 3 | 8 | 18:52 | 2 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 78 | 5.1 |
| Ales Hemsky, RW | 38 | 9 | 11 | 20 | -6 | 16 | 15:42 | 5 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 82 | 11.0 |
| Magnus Paajarvi, LW | 42 | 9 | 7 | 16 | -1 | 14 | 14:08 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 75 | 12.0 |
| Ryan Smyth, LW | 47 | 2 | 11 | 13 | -5 | 40 | 15:22 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 69 | 2.9 |
| Ryan Whitney, D | 34 | 4 | 9 | 13 | -7 | 23 | 18:29 | 0 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 30 | 13.3 |
| Jeff Petry, D | 48 | 3 | 9 | 12 | 1 | 29 | 21:55 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 66 | 4.5 |
| Shawn Horcoff, C | 31 | 7 | 5 | 12 | 8 | 24 | 16:51 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 41 | 17.1 |
| Nick Schultz, D | 48 | 1 | 8 | 9 | -13 | 24 | 18:38 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 33 | 3.0 |
| Lennart Petrell, C | 35 | 3 | 6 | 9 | -4 | 4 | 11:32 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 23 | 13.0 |
| Ryan Jones, RW | 27 | 2 | 5 | 7 | 0 | 17 | 12:59 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 38 | 5.3 |
| Mark Fistric, D | 25 | 0 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 32 | 15:20 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 9 | 0.0 |
| Ladislav Smid, D | 48 | 1 | 3 | 4 | -1 | 55 | 20:19 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 30 | 3.3 |
| Corey Potter, D | 33 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 8 | 6 | 17:27 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 36 | 8.3 |
| Eric Belanger, C | 26 | 0 | 3 | 3 | -1 | 10 | 14:07 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 31 | 0.0 |
| Teemu Hartikainen, C | 23 | 1 | 2 | 3 | -8 | 6 | 10:34 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 21 | 4.8 |
| Ben Eager, LW | 14 | 1 | 1 | 2 | -4 | 25 | 9:40 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 14 | 7.1 |
| Jerred Smithson, C † | 10 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 11:43 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 7 | 14.3 |
| Mike Brown, RW† | 27 | 1 | 0 | 1 | -8 | 53 | 8:48 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 16 | 6.3 |
| Anton Lander, C | 11 | 0 | 1 | 1 | -4 | 2 | 11:02 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 11 | 0.0 |
| Chris Vande Velde, C | 11 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -3 | 4 | 7:03 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 7 | 0.0 |
| Mark Arcobello, LW | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 18:15 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.0 |
| Theo Peckham, D | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -1 | 6 | 17:38 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0.0 |
| Darcy Hordichuk, LW | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -1 | 2 | 2:02 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.0 |
| PLAYER | GP | W | L | OTL | GAA | TOI | SV | SV% | SHO | TGA | TSA | PIM |
| Nikolai Khabibulin | 12 | 4 | 6 | 1 | 2.55 | 683:37 | 347 | .923 | 1 | 29 | 376 | 0 |
| Devan Dubnyk | 38 | 14 | 16 | 6 | 2.57 | 2100:57 | 1042 | .920 | 2 | 90 | 1132 | 0 |
| Yann Danis | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 3.81 | 110:15 | 52 | .881 | 0 | 7 | 59 | 0 |
