It is NHL Draft week, and the Edmonton Oilers’ amateur scouting department won’t make a pick until the third round, barring a trade. The Oilers are in win-now mode, and high draft picks will be rare for the foreseeable future. The amateur scouts will still be asked to find a player with the third, sixth or seventh round picks the Oilers currently have. It won’t be easy, but that’s the job.

Thankfully for the Oilers, the main focus of their summer won’t be the entry draft. It will be free agency and trades.

On Friday, general manager Stan Bowman outlined his plans for the summer. Changes will come at forward and in goal. He likes their defence group, and they currently have nine D-men signed who could play NHL games next season. Mattias Ekholm, Darnell Nurse, Brett Kulak, Jake Walman, Ty Emberson, Troy Stecher and Josh Brown played games this past season. Alec Regula, who they claimed on waivers from Boston in December, was still injured and didn’t play, but Bowman his high on him. They also signed Finnish defender Atro Leppänen. The 26-year-old had a great season with Vaasan Sport in Finland’s Liiga, recording a league-high 63 points with 21 goals and 42 assists in 60 games. Leppänen set the Liiga single-season record for most points by a defenceman. Evan Bouchard will make it 10 D-men once he signs his contract.

I could see the Oilers adding a right-shot defenceman near the trade deadline, but their current group is more than good enough to get them to the playoffs.

There will be multiple changes at forward. The Oilers had 19 forwards play in at least one game last season. Jeff Skinner and Derek Ryan won’t be back. Drake Caggiula signed in Europe. Viktor Arvidsson will be traded. There is a good chance Evander Kane will be moved, mainly for salary cap reasons. Quinn Hutson needs at least one season in the American Hockey League. I think the Oilers have room for one of Connor Brown or Corey Perry, but only at a lower price point than either could fetch on the open market.

Based on today’s roster of remaining signed players, the forward group looks like this:

Henrique – McDavid – Hyman
?? – Draisaitl – Savoie
Podkolzin – RNH – Tomasek
Janmark – Philp – Jones

I expect Trent Frederic to be signed and fill in the ?? on Draisaitl’s left wing. I have RNH as the third line centre, because I feel he plays better at centre. He’s quicker than Adam Henrique. Henrique is very smart and reliable defensively. I’d be intrigued to see him get a look on McDavid’s left wing. I think we could see a few different players slot in there during the regular season. Here are reasons why I’d give him a look with McDavid:

• Guys slower than him, mainly Pat Maroon, had lots of success with McDavid, and Henrique is a much better goal scorer than Maroon ever was. Henrique has 275 goals and 557 points in 993 games while Maroon had 126 in 848 games. Maroon had 49 goals in 154 games in Edmonton, most of those on McDavid’s line and he scored 77 goals in his other 694 games.
• RNH has not been productive as a first line left winger 5×5. The past two seasons he’s produced 20-31-51 in 2098 minutes at 5×5. He scored 12-19-31 in 980 minutes with McDavid. Adam Henrique scored 24-24-48 in 1938 minutes, and he only skated 53 minutes with McDavid. In those limited minutes they outscored opponents 9-1 and Henrique scored 3-2-5.
• I think RNH plays better when he’s at centre. He’s said many times he feels more in the game. He’s a better skater than Henrique, so I’d start the season swapping those two. Henrique is a very smart player. He’s very good positionally and last season McDavid had the highest GA/60 rate (2.91) of the past four seasons and in the playoffs, it was higher at 3.2 after being 1.93 in 2024. I’d at least try Henrique there and see. He has good offensive instincts and he’s sound defensively. And this allows RNH to be more mobile playing centre on the third line.

It isn’t out of the question the Oilers trade Henrique, but you can’t trade everyone, and Henrique, among others could get a look on McDavid’s wing. I just think RNH is better at centre, so I’d use the regular season to test drive other options. Edmonton could add a top-six winger at the deadline as well.

I could see Edmonton re-signing Kasperi Kapanen, and he would take Jones spot in the aforementioned lineup. Kapanen performed well in the playoffs. He admitted when he was claimed by the Oilers on waivers, he felt it might be his last chance to prove he belongs in the NHL. He earned Kris Knoblauch’s trust at the most important time of the year. He could possibly sign elsewhere for a bit higher of an AAV, but he is certain the coach will like him and play him? At $1m AAV, I’d sign Kapanen.

The other move I expect is adding a right-shot centre. The options are limited. Noah Philp will get a chance to win the job, but I expect Bowman to add someone competition.

The move that will generate the most interest and discussion will be in goal. Will Stan Bowman sign a free agent goalie, or will he make a trade? I understand those who feel Stuart Skinner isn’t the answer. The save percentage in the playoffs isn’t great, but I don’t believe save percentage is the best stat to evaluate a goalie on in 2025. What types of shots is he seeing. What are his strengths and weaknesses. Skinner had one bad goal in the playoffs, and it wasn’t from bad positioning, just a bad decision on the Panthers’ third goal in Game 6. It was an odd decision to not control the long shot, but he didn’t allow a weak goal or even a goal on a mid-tier chance. He needed to make a few more high-danger chance saves. I felt Skinner made progress this past year in the playoffs. He eliminated the weak goals. He’s still quite young in his overall development.

The only goalies younger than Skinner who played 20+ games in the NHL last year include Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen (55), Lukas Dostal (54), Dustin Wolf (53), Samuel Ersson (47), Pyotr Kochetkov (47), Spencer Knight (38), Arvid Soderblom (36), Justus Annunen (34) and Joel Hofer (31). They have combined for three playoff starts, all from Kochetkov. Skinner has made 50. He’s had some ups and downs, no question, but he’s earned valuable experience the past few seasons. I actually felt he was quite consistent this year. He didn’t allow a soft goal. Next step is making a few more big saves.

The only #1 starter who might be available is Jordan Binnington. If the Blues feel Hofer is ready to be a starter. Binnington has a $6m AAV for two more seasons. To make a trade work the Oilers would have to send out equal salary. I’d be leery of acquiring John Gibson. Ducks GM Pat Verbeek has realized his asking price was too high and he’s now willing to retain salary, which makes sense, and my concern is will Gibson be healthy when you need him? The best ability is availability. Skinner’s only injury history was a concussion last year after he got ran over. He’s been very durable in his career.

I can’t say with much confidence which UFA goalie would be the best. Goaltending is very hard to predict. If I had to pick between the UFA goalies of Jake Allen, Ilya Samsonov, Alex Lyon, Anton Forsberg, Vitek Vanecek and Dan Vladar my first choice would be Forsberg. He has started 124 games the past four seasons, which is 37th most among goalies. He has solid numbers with a 2.87 GAA and .905 save percentage. The most important question is do his strengths/weakness fit with Edmonton.

Kevin Woodley will join me on Sports1440 this afternoon to discuss their strengths and weaknesses and see which one matches best with how the Oilers play. That is more important than their career save percentage or GAA.

NEWS AND NOTES…

— I was unable to attend Bruce McCurdy’s celebration of life in person yesterday as my son was in a soccer tournament, but I watched much of it online between games. I really enjoyed the words of his siblings, his childhood friends (that one really choked me up), his astronomy friends and of course his son Kevin. I learned a lot about Bruce I never knew. I hope his wife Anna, Kevin and all of his close friends and family got a bit of closure yesterday. It was a beautiful celebration of a life well lived.

— It is good to remember the Oilers won’t complete their playoff roster this summer. Their core is good enough to make the playoffs, and they simply don’t have enough cap space to add a top six winger and top four RD and carry their full AAV all season. Those additions will come in-season.

— Over the next few seasons, the Oilers, like many top contenders, won’t have many high draft picks. Florida doesn’t have a pick in the first three rounds. Edmonton and Dallas each have one 3rd round pick. Toronto and Vegas each have a 2nd and 3rd. Carolina and Winnipeg have a 1st and 3rd. I don’t see that changing for the Oilers in the coming years. That doesn’t mean they won’t have young players in the system. They acquired Matt Savoie for Ryan McLeod. They acquired Roby Jarventie for Xavier Bourgault. And in the past two months they signed free agents David Tomasek (29 years old), Josh Samanski (23), Quinn Hutson (23) and Viljami Marjala (22) out of Europe of NCAA. They won’t all play in the NHL, and none might, but these signings will be in place of draft picks, just with players who aren’t 18 or 19.

Savoie will be given every chance to make the team out of training camp. Same with Tomasek, and then we’ll see how they fare in the regular season. We didn’t see many rookies on winning teams this postseason.

Only Lian Bischel and Oskar Bäck (DAL), Ryan Leonard (WSH) and Logan Stankoven and Jackson Blake (CAR) played on a team who won a round. Only Stankoven and Blake scored a goal and had more than two points. Only two rookie forwards produced more than Stankoven’s eight points in the past five seasons; Denis Gurianov had 17 points in 24 games with Dallas in the 2020 bubble and eight of those points came in two games, and Cole Caufield had 12 points in 20 games with Montreal in 2021. It is possible, but very rare to expect a rookie forward to have a big impact. Jake Guentzel in 2017 with Pittsburgh was the most impactful in the past decade scoring 13 goals and 21 points. It is best to have realistic expectations of what a rookie, especially a 21- or 22-year-old, might do in their first playoff appearance.

— Non-hockey note. I really hope OKC Thunder GM, Sam Presit, writes an autobiography one day. He graduated College in 2000, and that summer while working at a basketball camp, he got an internship from San Antonio Spurs GM, RC Buford. The story goes that while Buford was referring the game at the camp, Presti walked/ran up and down the sideline with Buford telling him why he should get the internship. Presti got and started as a video coordinator for head coach Gregg Popovich. He worked his way up the ranks and in 2005 was named VP and assistant GM. He was part of the Spurs team that won in 2003, 2005 and 2007.

Then he got hired to be the GM of the Seattle Supersonics (they moved to OKC after two years) when he was only 29 years old. He built up OKC through the draft with Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, Serge Ibaka and James Harden. OKC became good, but didn’t win with those stars before trading them and rebuilding. Presti has remained with OKC for 19 years and they just won the title with one of the most dominant seasons in NBA history. They are very good, young and very deep. Their top pick in 2024, Nicola Topic, didn’t play this year due to injury. He will be ready next year to join a loaded Thunder team. And the Thunder are poised to be good for years. Here’s a look at their draft picks for the next six seasons. *1st round picks in red*.