The Oilers timed the Evander Kane return just right. All those injuries and procedures needed time to heal, and the big man looks top drawer in the playoffs this spring.
How valuable is a power forward with speed and a plus shot at this time of year? Massive. He is 2-1-3 through five playoff games in 2025, and looks to be a big piece for the team over the rest of the postseason.
Kane’s signing to a long-term deal repeated a problem this team has lived with for several years. Players who own a style like Kane’s resume often get hurt. The organization values what these players bring, so these big men play through injuries deemed less than lineup altering.
So, when Kane signed a four-year deal ($5.13AAV via PuckPedia) Oilers fans knew health was a part of the deal. There would be times when he wasn’t available (43, 41, 77 and zero games, by regular season) but his unique qualities were viewed as being worth the risk.
The trick is to sign physical wingers in their late 20’s to shorter deals that do no include any kind of no-movement clause. The Oilers are (I hope) going to take a run at Trent Frederic before July 1, and a three-year deal should be the outer marker.
Which brings us back to Kane. He has one year left on his deal, and he is playing well. The AAV on the contract is more than justified if he can play this well next season and in the playoffs 2026.
We spent a lot of time contemplating a Kane trade at the deadline. Stan Bowman kept his powder dry. It is turning out very well. Should the Oilers keep Kane for his final season, while also signing Trent Frederic to a three-year deal?
New for The Athletic: How Ty Emberson’s role with Edmonton Oilers has evolved in NHL playoffs
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6331349/2025/05/04/oilers-ty-emberson-stats-nhl-playoffs/
am kinda surprised to see the Oilers slightly favoured vs VGK.
the underdog role suits them better!
Anyone else notice that in the last 4 minutes of the 3rd trying to hold off the Jets while up 3-1 and then 3-2 that Broberg did not see the ice? For all the talk by Godot about how great Broberg has already become Jim Montgomery trusted his other 4 defenseman (Parayko, Fowler, Faulk and even Suter) more than Broberg in that situation.
I am sure Godot will say that is probably the reason they didn’t hold the lead and I bet Montgomery is now off Godot’s Xmas card list.
Well at least we won’t have to see all his posts about how great he thinks Broberg and Holloway are doing for at least 5 months. However more than half his posts after any Oiler loss going forward will still likely be claiming that Broberg and/or Holloway would have reversed that outcome.
If Broberg is not defensively better than Fowler and especially Faulk, that’s really saying something.
Montgomery was a fool for his D deployment in the last 4 minutes. He has been defereing to the veteran D all year in 5×6 all year with diastrous results.
Faulk is a tire fire defensively without Broberg. I will post some stats when I recover from the pain in a couple of days.
Broberg was on for ZERO goals against in this series at 5×5, and only 1 goal against in total, a PP goal against. 100% GF 5×5 in the playoffs this year, and in the top 3 in %GF 5×5 in the regular season for D who played more than 1000 minutes.
Faulk has leaked goals against all season without Broberg. When Broberg had to leave the game for 3 minutes at the end of the 2nd period of game 4, Winnipeg almost scored immediately against Faulk and Leddy.
At the end of this game, Faulk leaked two almost immediately without Broberg, one with Suter, and one with Parayko.
Broberg #3 in ice time for all the Blues
Another dynamite 1st round in the books and the only 2 “upsets” were the defending Stanley Cup champs and the defending Western Conference champs winning their respective series!
Is offer sheet Karma a thing?
Truth be told, August 13 and 20 were big days in the Blues getting in to the playoffs……
Although Holloway wasn’t able to help the team in the playoffs.
Blues spent the last 7 minutes of the 3rd period trying not to be scored on and it cost them the game and the series.
I thought that they had no push forward cost them
That’s great for the city of Winnipeg
Non-zero percent chance Portage and Main collapses tonight in a combination of remedial below-ground work and Jets fans.
All this to say The City of Winnipeg thanks the Hockey Gords for tonight’s achievement.
Nice
I don’t have any skin in the game – I’ve never been to Winnipeg – but I think every fan base deserves 1 playoff run every once in a while
Especially when they were the best team in the regular season.
This game is quite intense. I feel so anxious, and I’m not a fan of either team. Go Jets!
Will the Blues get a powerplay?
Jets with the most pedestrian game 7 OT powerplay i’ve seen in ages. That kind of effort usually displeases the hockey gods…we wait.
I dunno. A lot of playoff OT goals are pretty weak.
Perfetti tying it with 2 seconds left is anything but pedestrian.
Ehlers was having a pretty rough game, and his poor plays in the dying seconds made his cross ice apple possible. Betting on hockey these playoffs is lunacy
Unbelievable! Both these game 7’s this weekend were absolute snooze fests in the first but as usual turn into absolute nail biting clinchers even for a neutral viewer.
I lke the way… Snrub thinks!
Who do the Jets think they are? The Oilers?
Unbelievable.
The refs are letting the Jets literally murder their way back into the game.
It’s the Blues, so..
Good!
And they got back in . . . 1.6 seconds remaining, Jets tie it up . . . off to OT.
Crazy.
Now that’s cutting it close…
Did the Jets challenge this?
Oh my, I am thankful we do not have John Garret doing color
Did Broberg deflect that past Binnington (the 3-2 goal).
Suter
The Jets thinking they can beat Binnington by shooting from the boards is pretty damn baffling. Not like the Blues have 5 monsters in the slot.
Were the 2nd and 3rd goals scored with shots “from the boards’?
They finally started going to the slot instead of straight at Binnington.
Subtle but hugely important. Literally a giveaway vs a chance.
Namestnikov also managed to step in. They had been basically lobbing straight at the goalie with their rear ends on the boards prior to that.
Q: Do you know why there are no infants allowed at this game?
A: The Jets are a choking hazard.
Watching the Jets and boy do I not miss Harnarayan. Strange cadences that don’t really match the play. “BARRON IS NEAR THE NET!!!!!”
Regular incorrect player IDs.
One year experience five times in my opinion.
Snuggerooood.
Why announcers don’t make the effort to find and use proper pronunciation, I really can’t comprehend.
I would never neglect an equivalently basic element of my job.
All the names have to be anglicised to a degree. I can confidently say that all of the Swedish names are English approximations. We just don’t make the proper vowel sounds. Especially because the Canadian dialect tends to elongate vowel sounds.
It isn’t the more challenging foreign names I’m speaking of though.
Snuggerud is easy to pronounce. Botched.
The Jets radio announcer was saying Pee-yonk instead of Pee-onk.
Bouchard can either be pronounced with a straightforward Boosh-ard or with a heavy French accent – neither of these come out of the Oilers’ announcers mouths. There are not 17 os in Bouchard – and the syllables aren’t done properly.
They’ve managed to completely screw up Podkolzin somehow – despite it essentially being phonetic.
Jack used to call him “Brett Koo-lawk” before someone obviously corrected him and he listened for a change. (Louie and others on the broadcast sometimes do say things the right way, with emphasis in their voices, it has no effect).
I could go on…then again half of them don’t realize it isn’t a “pawck” – so this is what we’re working with apparently.
Rod spoiled us rotten.
Jets have injury issues but still, they are not very good. Their D are poor at making plays at the line.
This is plain, boring hockey. Looks slow and sloppy. No effort to get to the middle of the ice.
Weird season/playoffs IMO.
I am shocked that the Avs lost to Dallas sans Miro and Robertson.
East looks like Florida’s to lose.
Dallas with Miro and Robertson returning will be tough to beat.
Yeah, it feels like whoever comes out this the west will take it all, with only possibly Florida to stand in their way.
I’m of the opposite opinion, if the Jets lose I think all except the Blues are true contenders.
The Jets are masters at winning meaningless games in January and then flopping every playoff. It must be exhausting being a fan of Winnipeg. Same applys for the Canucks over the years.
Dagger in the last few minutes of the 2nd.
Another poor neutral zone play by a Jets start player…..
Heck of a tip by Perfetti.
End of 3rd period update: he seems to be pretty good at this.
If and it’s a big if that we break even on the penalty calls we win this series easy peasy. I expect Vegas to average a extra PP per game with not many penalties called in total.
Its an absolute smashfest out there.
Broberg has been annihalated 3 times I think….
Hellebuyck is playing poorly, but the Jets won’t win anything if they can only muster 3 shots in a period.
Last game they had 11 shots through 2… Binnington is one of the most overrated goalies out there but he’s not that bad.
FYI as of right now Hellebuyck has an .809 sv% in the postseason this year… behind Stuart Skinner’s .810. Imagine the vitriol if we were paying Skinner $8.5M.
Edmonton is one of the toughest places to play net the faithful would break Hellebuyck in two.
Imagine the vitriol in Manitoba if the Jets lose in round 1 to the Blues
I’m not going to pretend that the Avs sucked this year. But there were too many in-season fixes employed which reflected poor planning in the off season. Some trades were necessary but many were self-inflicted. It was a bit like watching my kid on NHL 25 be a GM mode. Like pump the brakes, son!
The goaltending upgrades were the best move, followed by a sizable long term contract to a career back up
The Brock Nelson and Ryan Lindgren trades were poor at the time they were made. Nelson has never been a strong 2 way player and Lindgren was having a poor year and a change of scenery didn’t help. Lost some draft picks and prospects.
They got 7 years older with Coyle over Mittelstadt.
I admittedly didn’t initially hate the Rantanen trade because I think Necas is a strong even strength player. But Rantanen had something to say about that, and if he truly had reasonable salary demands, this should have been a fireable offense.
Colorado will remain competitive. But MacKinnon sounded like a broken man. They ultimately lost to a cup favorite team without their top D and F. But it’s worse than that. They took some provisions out of the cupboard. And what no one is talking about it that they semi-circumvented the cap by 7 mil with Landeskog and still couldn’t get it done, and that opportunity will be gone next year.
I loved that Rantanen wanted to come to Edmonton. A shame that we just didn’t have the assets to accommodate that trade.
We could have offered Bouchard…
Rantanen was a very tough negotiator in his previous contract. When Rantanen started out with a really high ask this time around, Macfarland wasn’t going to do it again. (Especially because he’ll have to find money to pay Makar soon.)
Obviously it doesn’t look good right now, but it might have been the right call.
Nope, Connor H. has NOT found his game, even at home.
Bad play by Connor in the neutral zone but that’s an awful goal for the 2-0.
It’s honestly pretty unreal at this point. The inability to make a save, the stubbornness of Arniel, 2 goals against in the first 4 shots, all of it.
Terrible goal. I still do not believe the Blues are for real, the Jets are just this poor.
Crosby going to play in the World Championships.
Will Nate follow suit?
Phenomenal news. I’ve never agreed with the philosophy of playing fringe NHL rookies and giving the vets the summer off. More great leadership by Crosby, and hopefully MacKinnon
Answer: Yes.
That’s awesome. Respect to them both.
Parayko just had a wide open net and, for some reason, passed out of it – it was a crappy pass but they got super lucky and still scored.
Weird play but crazy quick start.
Jets own-zone coverage – whoof.
DeMelo with the step up.
Prediction: If the Panthers fail to re-sign him, Sam Bennett lands with the Wild next year.
The timing is not right for the Oilers as Henrique and Arvidsson each have one more year.
A smart GM would find the room to sign Bennett if he was interested
Nah, a smart GM traded for him when he was young and cheap.
The next GM is going to sign him for too much and too long. Too many hard miles, pass.
Minnesota has the cap space and an urgent need. They can be contenders immediately with an additional one or two core players.
He should be in demand. Ottawa would be another good spot for him.
It seems almost inevitable that Brock Boeser will end up back home in Minnesota but, you’re correct they have a pressing need for an impact centre.
I wonder if they might take a run at Elias Pettersson thinking they can resurrect his career,
Huh?
No good player would ever leave such an exemplary franchise as the Vancouver canucks
We got Hyman when he was 28, no? I agree with not signing him more than 4-5 years, so you’re probably right, but he has less miles on him than Kane
Yeah, and if we were in the same spot now as we were in then I’d be all for it.
The pre-game skates and whatnot have Nurse/Bouchard together but, yet, Nurse played 8:24 with Kulak and 5:01 with Bouchard last game.
I expect a similar type deployment.
This series will come down to those 5 gentlemen who will play 20 minutes plus per game on the Oilers blue line.
Frankly I thought the forwards were outstanding. They put up terrific numbers offensively and in general, I thought they weren’t really the cause of most of the defensive blunders. Brown, Nuge, Hyman, Podz, Janmark and Rico were noticeable defensively.
Wheras the Oilers defensemen were also good offensively but, as a group, pretty terrible defensively. If we’re talking defense-only…
Kulak was good.
Klingberg was better than expected but still gave up some glorious chances including an almost series-altering breakaway to Kempe.
Defensively, Nurse, Bouchard and Walman were all out to lunch, Walman’s +8 be damned. And that’s against a team that doesn’t forecheck
To be fair, defending off the rush was a much bigger challenge for this team in the first round, which was why LA focused here early and often. I think the Oilers were excellent at defending against the forecheck and cycle in the final 2 games, but admittedly it is the eye test. In game 5 they limited the forecheck through sheer domination, while in game 6 they were sloppy with giving up odd man rushes and the even strength goals against were all off the rush, and didn’t give up much elsewhere.
NHL_sid tracked these game state chances last year.
Keep Kane for his contract year. He’s healthy and will be well motivated to earn another big contract.
Given his injury history I doubt he fetches much value in a trade.
Yes on the first point and disagree on the second.
If he’s healthy he’s healthy. He’s too rare a player type for GMs to ignore the upside.
I think I want Winnipeg to win tonight as I’m not sure the Blues can beat the Stars but the Jets maybe can (if their goalie finds a semblance of his normal game).
Don’t get be wrong, I think the Oilers can beat the Stars again in a re-match but they will be a tough out.
If they’re going to win, EDM need to be able to take on all comers.
Bring ’em on, don’t care who.
I want the Blues Oilers, for the next five years in the conference finals! -).
So you can cheer against Broberg and Holloway, your favorite players?
The Blues just keep hanging in there the Jets are missing a element that allows them to win big games. Blues in OT tonight then they ride the wave in 6 against the Stars.
Vegas Golden Knights vs. Edmonton Oilers
Game 1: Tuesday, May 6, 9:30 p.m.
Game 2: Thursday, May 8, 9:30 p.m.
Game 3: Saturday, May 10, TBD
Game 4: Monday, May 12, TBD
* Game 5: Wednesday, May 14, TBD
* Game 6: Friday, May 16, TBD
* Game 7: Sunday, May 18, TBD
Notable for no extra days off while the Leafs/Panthers & Capitals/Hurricanes get a 2 day break for game # 5. No schedule for Jets/Blues vs Stars yet obviously.
— yeah that seems strange..
— Do they fly to Vegas today or tmrw?
I believe they’ll fly tomorrow – coach kind of alluded to not knowing if which day they’d fly as they didn’t know when the series started.
— makes sense to fly in Monday. 8 sleeps in a row at home good way to set up for round 2….
7:30 pm, *MT
having the Nurse Bouchard duo out against the Eichel line makes me a bit nervous. Stoping that line will be the key to the series
If Kane has an excellent playoff you have to sell high.
Too depleted on youth and draft picks. If this wasn’t so I’d keep him.
Too bad we didn’t have a GM like Sather still… If Slats was GM last summer he’d have matched both offer sheets and traded both players this summer. I’d bet on it.
Unfortunately slats couldn’t have matched the offer sheets without trading someone and everyone has NMCs. So would dumping Ekholm for cheap to keep Broberg for a year help us that much?
If someone offers full value for Kane you trade him. Otherwise you keep him. It’s his last chance at a pay day and he’ll be motivated
They had the cap room with Kane on LTIR
Only if they felt comfortable assuming last August that Kane was going to stay on LTIR for the whole regular season. They absolutely did not feel comfortable with that so they couldn’t box themselves in where if Kane were coming off LTIR in season, they wouldn’t have the cap room.
I listened to The Athletic hockey podcast this week. They covered the 2025 draft class, the conclusion was a weak top 10 and no consensus of what the first round picks would be…still to early???
The O’Reilly trade last year is looking like one of those small smart moves, good clubs make to win.
The player seems to be popping right now.
Ah, but then the next two drafts after this year’s will really be something.
Misa and Schaefer have been projected to be #2 and #1 respectively for a while now, though. Did that change at The Athletic when both ran into the Knights juggernaut during the OHL playoffs? That’s a bit unfair!
Per Stauff:
Not surprised to see no changes.
I wouldn’t touch the bottom two lines right now but could/would be amenable mixing up the top 6 a bit for split McDavid/Leon.
Then again, I think some models had the Kane/Nuge/Hyman line as the best line in the 1st round – expected numbers.
Nurse-Bouchard was a massive problem vs the Kings, it’s a pairing that’s unlikely to be much different vs the Knights.
Really don’t know why the coaching staff are so adverse to fading Nurse a bit and play him with Emberson or stetcher, and playing kulak with Bouchard. The numbers don’t lie. Bouch plays better without him, and the Walman-Klingberg Duo is killing it. Will they not even try it?
Apparently, time wise, they have been. They’ve been playing them less together.
Prior to Kane playing these playoffs I would have bet large Kane would be traded in the summer, It could still be the right call but we need to see the results of these playoffs before making any decision on Kane. On Fredrick I think a decision could be made anytime soon as it would not be an over exagerated contract
Yes, keep Kane.
Excited to see if the new big bad Oilers can wear down the trees Vegas deploys.
Hyman may break 100 hits by the end of the series lol
Lots of players fade when the competition gets tougher and the game tougher in the playoffs.
The Oilers seems to have quite a few guys that step up their games from the depths – Brown, Janmark, Kane, Klingberg, Rico, Kulak
Their top guys also either at least match regular season impact or, again, improve – Bouch, McDavid, Hyman, Drai, etc.
Nurse is an outlier here – hope he can simplify in the defensive zone and gain confidence in zone denial.
Nurse seems to struggle generally in the first pairing and seems much better in the second. If Coffey is stubborn with his deployment, EDM is going to get behind and chase because of the Nurse-Bouchard pairing.
I think they should try flipping Nurse and Walman
I think that’s a strong option until Ekholm returns, but it would have to be predicated with Walman playing as the defensive conscience on the pairing. He can tend to rove a bit, probably very much so to the chagrin of one resident bear.
If Walman is the KISS player on the pairing it could thrive.
Cap space is important but, if Kane is healthy, he’s still a 25 goal guy that brings other elements (acknowledging some warts in his 2-way game) and, importantly, a guy that tends to step up in the playoffs (when healthy).
A healthy Kane is value for $5MM even at 34.
I say ride that contract through. A final year of effective Kane is worth losing him for ‘nothing,’ and little is lost letting a player that age find a new rink. For all we know Kane may be willing to re-sign one-year contracts after this (I don’t personally think that to be the case, but who’s to say what Kane will want two playoffs from now).
Agreed, and I’ve been saying as much.
The other side, is if other players are stepping up their games and the role can be filled by committee, then flipping him for a cost-effective top-4 RHD would go a long way to building up the roster going forward.
Adding Kane and Frederic with increasing health made a massive difference – players get pressed down the lineup (and out of the lineup) and the team is deeper and better.
McDavid and Drai played 21-22 minute in game 6 – average ice time for them.
Klingberg had a similar impact in the backend.
The Oilers are healthy scratching legit NHL players both up front (Skinner, Kap and Ryan and Jones to a lesser extent) and in the backend (Stecher).
I do think we get to Adin Hill even though he’s played well against us. We now have a a better read on his weak spots. How many games will Pickard need to win in a row before the mob allows him the following start under or over seven?
Win and you’re in. Same applies to Skinner. They now have dueling goaltenders.
So if either one loses a game you sit him the following game. Didn’t Boston kinda try that with Swayman and Ullmark a few years back. I have no idea how many consecutive starts Pickard career high is but it has to be under ten.
I could care less how many consecutive career starts Pickard has. All that matters is winning.
Ride the hot hand, while allowing room for redemption.
Who exactly is this anti-Pickard mob you keep referring to?
Are you talking about the Internet writ large, or a contingent of posters here?
Because most people here are pro-Pickard.
Some have questions about parsing advanced analytics saying he’s a league leader vis a vis quality starts, etc, when accounting for quality of competition. But that’s not the same as saying they’re anti-Pickard.
I have been extremely pro-Skinner. Maybe the most here. Although Godot and OP seem to be in company. Part of that is personal , as I have have taught a few of his siblings. Part is the feeling like he got hung out to dry. I have posted a bunch of times defending him. I think I must be a part of this group.
That said, I am definitely am not anti Pickard. I endorse his starting, cheer hard from him, and hope he’s in the net when we win the cup. I think my fellow pro Skinner crowd agrees!
For me, a loss can’t remove him from the net. You can’t operate like that. It would have to some number (>1) of sub par or fairly bad performances that brings Skinner back. For Skinner that number was 2 (with super bad d). Pickard should at the least be given that same amount of rope.
Whether the team keeps him or not, the fact that Kane is back and showing he can still play is great news for the Oilers. He’s either staking a claim to a roster spot next year or upping his trade value in a year without many comparable options in UFA. NJ seems like they’d be a good candidate to send a pick or two our way for him.