The numbers behind the Oilers’ star-fuelled strong start

The Edmonton Oilers that we’ve seen for the first four games under Mike Babcock have not been the team that we were promised we’d get under the veteran head coach.

We were promised attention to detail, defensive structure, and larger roles for the depth players on this team. What we’ve gotten is a total of 38 goals through four games, with the Oilers scoring 22 of them.

At the forefront of all that offence are the usual suspects. Connor McDavid is off to the best start of his career, averaging three points per game. Vasily Podkolzin has four goals in four games. Evan Bouchard is leading the NHL in goals with six.

When the Oilers’ best players are on the ice, it looks like they’re playing against competition that is a league below them.

Here are some numbers, courtesy of Natural Stat Trick, that show just how dominant the top line of McDavid, Podkolzin and Leon Draisaitl has been:

37 five-on-five mins

Shot Attempts 49-17

Shots 21-8

Goals 7-0

That is just pure dominance. No other way to put it.

I used the line tool on Moneypuck.com and looked up defensive pairings and lines that have spent at least 20 mins together this season at five-on-five. The Oilers’ top line has 11.14 goals per hour. The second-best pairing or line in the league has 8.76 goals per hour… and it’s the pairing of Ryan Shea and Evan Bouchard, who obviously spend the bulk of their time on the ice together playing with the top forward line.

I bring up that fact a little tongue-in-cheek. Obviously, the defensive pairing that plays with the best forward line in the league will have some exceptional on-ice numbers.

All jokes aside, the next best trio of forwards in the league is Kaapo Kakko, Shane Wright and Berkly Catton in Seattle, who are rocking a GF/60 of 8.65. That is roughly 2.5 goals per hour behind the Oilers trio, and what makes the numbers even crazier, they’re the only other line in the league with a number above 8.

The Oilers top line is over three goals per hour better than the third-best line in hockey.

Whatever way you dice it up, the top line, along with Bouchard, has been carrying this team through the first four games of the season.

With the big dogs off the ice, it’s a similar story to years past. 

With all three of McDavid, Draisaitl and Podkolzin off the ice, the Oilers are minus-4 at five-on-five through four games.

With Evan Bouchard on the ice at five-on-five, they’re plus-10. With him off the ice, they’re minus-5. Granted, that’s all time when Shakir Mukhamadullin was on the ice.

In years past, I would be critical of the fact that the Oilers aren’t getting any support from the rest of their lineup, but considering the injuries that they’re currently battling through, I’m not going to complain at all.

The fact that they’ve been missing Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Matt Savoie for all four games, and both Zach Hyman and Jason Dickinson have missed three games each, and the team still has scooped up seven of the eight points available to them, is a major positive for this team.

Especially when you consider how poorly they’ve started the regular season in years past, it’s hard to complain about a 3-0-1 record to start the year.

Last year, it took them over 50 games to win three in a row. They wasted little time getting to that mark this season.

Still, the Oilers playing high-scoring games where their star players need to produce close to all the offence is not a recipe for long-term success. If December rolls around and they’re still only winning games if McDavid, Draisaitl and Bouchard drive all the offence, then I’d consider it problematic.

For now, I’m going to sit back and enjoy the show, and honestly, I feel like Mike Babcock might be doing a little bit of the same.

He knows this team is banged up and missing what would be a pretty strong second line with Nugent-Hopkins, Savoie and Hyman. He knows they need to be better with their key players off the ice, but wins right now are worth just as much as wins in February and March, so rack ‘em up whatever way you can.