The Edmonton Oilers have had a dreadful start to the season, one that led to the dismissal of head coach Jay Woodcroft. There are several factors that have led the Oilers to this point, one of them being the lack of production from their top two players Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl.
The duo averaged a combined 3.4 points per game last season with McDavid winning his third MVP award. This year McDavid has just 13 points in 14 games and Draisaitl has six goals after scoring 107 over the last two seasons.
“We were saying that the other day,” Draisaitl said, per Mark Spector. “This has never happened, that both of us have felt this way. It's a bad time.”
McDavid has three points in his last six games and Draisaitl went five games with only two points before he notched six in the next two games.
“Certainly not to our standard,” Draisaitl said. “Things are seemingly a little harder right now than they normally are, and that spirals a little bit. You know, we're human beings, and we care a lot. I'm working on finding my game as soon as possible.”
Oilers need to figure it out
After a couple of seasons of missing the playoffs and a few first-round exits, the Oilers finally had some playoff success the last couple of seasons. Back-to-back 100-point seasons with three playoff series wins to boot set Edmonton up for a big campaign in 2023-24.
A 2-9-1 start was surely unexpected and firing Woodcroft probably didn’t seem like a plausible option until it was the only option available. The move blindsided McDavid, who will likely use the head coach's departure as a motivating tool.
“Listen, we've done it for a long, long stretch of time. And we'll get back there again,” McDavid said. “We don't stop believing, even though everyone else might. We believe, not only in ourselves but in each other, in our group.”
The bottom line is that it was the players' underperformance that led to Woodcroft's firing. They know that, so picking up the slack of the first couple of weeks of the season is crucial for the Oilers.
McDavid is too good to not get out of this funk. While he might not be a nearly two-point-per-game player this year he should still push 100 points again and be among the league's top goalscorers. Draisaitl has started to figure it out and is at least staying involved in goals even if he's not scoring them.
Them alone may not be enough to get the Oilers back into the playoffs, but Edmonton will like its chances a lot more if McDavid and Draisaitl are producing as expected.
The Oilers have played well as of late, winning three of their last four games. If they continue to trend upward, with Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl leading the way, they'll be a dangerous team once the calendar flips to the new year.
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