The Old Man and the C

One thing we can agree on about the Edmonton Oilers: when they are good enough to make a SCF, they are strong, strong, strong at center ice. When the club was winning Stanley's in the 1980s and 1990, center was the domain of 99, 11 and several other top quality men of varying skills. In the 2006 Stanley run, Edmonton also boasted a nice group of men (among them Shawn Horcoff and Michael Peca) in the middle.Since that time, Edmonton has been in a "rebuild" period brought on by the dual trading of Pronger for kids and the decision not to replace the veteran D lost that summer (Pronger, Spacek, Tarnstrom) with anything resembling NHL players. So the Oilers decided to bring in kids at center as well. Here's a quick look at opening nights over the last 4 seasons at the position:2005-Horcoff, Peca, Stoll, Reasoner2006-Horcoff, Sykora, Stoll, Reasoner2007-Horcoff, Stoll, Reasoner, Cogliano2008-Horcoff, Gagner, Pisani, BrodziakCogliano was on last year's team and did p...