The Edmonton Oilers are off to a white-hot start under new head coach Mike Babcock. The team has raced out to an 8-2-1 (127-point pace) record, keyed by a captain who looks unstoppable right now.
At some point I will run out of words to describe how devastating a player Connor McDavid is on the ice, but that day is not today. One of the reasons McDavid is so captivating as a player is he continues to raise the bar of what we consider exceptional play. His scoring explosion early this season has been something to behold.
Babcock has opted to load up his top line, pairing McDavid with fellow superstar Leon Draisaitl and the versatile Vasily Podkolzin. To say this trio has been toying with the Western Conference would be an understatement – at even strength, goals are 21-8 (+13) in just 171 minutes.
There will be debate about the viability of this strategy against better opponents come playoff time; deeper teams in years past have found ways to beat Edmonton by playing containment against the McDavid line, and doing significant damage against the rest of the lineup. Perhaps general manager Stan Bowman can bolster the bottom half of their roster in advance of this year’s Stanley Cup push, but that remains to be seen.
But for the time being, loading up the top line has been remarkably successful for the Oilers in the standings, and much of it ties back to how lethal McDavid has been.
Oddsmakers have already priced McDavid as the odds-on favourite to win the Art Ross Trophy – such is life when you score a remarkable 33 points in 11 games:
When you consider how much offensive firepower is around the league (much of it shown on the above table) and then realize the amount of daylight McDavid has put between himself and the field, you start to appreciate how big of an outlier performance we are witnessing.
Ottawa’s Tim Stutzle and Boston’s David Pastrnak are two of the best attackers in the world, and they have scored half as many points as McDavid (despite playing more games).
But even for McDavid, this is unprecedented. If we look at McDavid’s career all-situations scoring on a 10-game average, you see that this is uncharted territory for the 29-year-old centre – at no point has he ever put on a scoring run like this.
What’s notable amidst this run is that Edmonton is doing considerable damage in all game states with McDavid deployed; consistent with every year prior, but also to the upside of even McDavid’s multi-year averages.
McDavid’s line is scoring 6.4 goals per 60 minutes at 5-on-5, which is unheard of firepower for the modern NHL and nearly double his five-year trailing average. And the power play is also at a five-year high: the Oilers are averaging 18.1 goals per 60 minutes on the man advantage with their first unit on. For benchmarking purposes, Utah leads the league in rate power-play scoring at 16 goals per 60 minutes played.
McDavid has been the best player on the planet for some time now, but I’m blown away with what we are seeing this season – even by his lofty standards. The Oilers are cooking with gas, and it’s this supreme talent at the top of the lineup who is keying everything.
Data via Natural Stat Trick, NHL.com, Evolving Hockey, Hockey Reference