For the first time in many years, the Edmonton Oilers look to have rookies on their roster that are expected to make an impact in their freshman season. Both Isaac Howard and Matt Savoie are expected to compete for top-six jobs and run shotgun with either Connor McDavid or Leon Draisaitl. Given the same, it is safe to say that there are expectations that go along with that role, despite being raw rookies (especially in Howard’s case, who is coming straight out of college hockey for his first ever professional season).

If they do succeed, could this possibly be the season where an Oiler finally wins the Calder Trophy? It seems crazy to think that no Oiler has done that, given the wealth of the early draft picks recently and the slew of Hall of Famers in the ‘80s, but alas it has not come to pass for the franchise. The Oilers are one of only six clubs, alongside Anaheim, Vegas, Nashville, Tampa Bay and Philadelphia, to not have that honour (I guess seven franchises if you consider Utah is technically a completely different franchise from the Phoenix Coyotes/Winnipeg Jets 1.0). Granted, Winnipeg 2.0 and Dallas are franchises where their previous location was the one with the winning rookie, but that still counts for them I would say.

But despite not having the hardware, that doesn’t mean there haven’t been good rookie seasons in the 45 seasons this team has played in the NHL. Here are some of the best rookie seasons in the franchise’s history.

I should note that for the purposes of this article, we are looking at Calder Trophy eligible seasons, which unfortunately means we aren’t getting what would certainly be considered the best rookie season, being Wayne Gretzky’s 51 goals and 137 points in 1979–80 because the NHL purposefully changed the criteria so he couldn’t win.

Jari Kurri, 1980–81

While Gretzky wasn’t eligible in his first NHL season, his future running mate was, joining the team the season after and making an immediate impact finishing second on the team in goals (32), assists (43) and points (75) in 75 games.

The assists and points markers continue to be franchise records for a rookie. Somehow that wasn’t enough to garner any Calder consideration, however.

Glenn Anderson, 1980–81

Another rookie on the Oilers that same year did get some Calder votes though. Anderson finished third on the team in goals (30) and fifth in points with 53 in just 58 games.

It is likely that goal scoring pace that pushed voters towards him over Kurri. Or should I say, voter (singular), as he finished 11th with one vote.

Fun fact: that 42.4 goal pace is actually second in franchise history, behind the legendary Brent Grieve, who scored 13 goals in just 24 games in 1993–94. Grieve would go on to score just seven more goals in the next 73 games of his career though, which is just a tad shy of Anderson’s 458 goals in his remaining 1,071 games.

Grant Fuhr, 1981–82

The next year saw the Oilers have their first legitimate Calder Trophy candidate. Grant Fuhr won the starting job, playing in 48 games, posting 28 wins and finishing third in Calder voting. Both those games played and wins numbers would be franchise records for almost 30 years, along with saves as a rookie (1,389) until someone else came onto the scene.

Fuhr’s 0.898 save percentage and 3.31 GAA were also franchise records until 2009–10, which shows just how not great the Oilers have been at developing their own home grown goalies.

Jason Arnott, 1993–94

Once again, there was a year where where the Oilers graduated two rookies—one set a franchise record without getting any Calder love, but the other did. In this case, the snub of Grieve was avenged by Jason Arnott, whose 33 goals is the current franchise record, along with 68 points for second. That also put him in first on the team for goals that year and second in points.

That earned Arnott the runner up position for the Calder behind some guy named Martin Brodeur, who I am sure did nothing else noteworthy the rest of his career.

David Oliver, 1994–95

In 44 games during a lockout shortened season, Oliver’s 16 goals and 30 points were good enough for third in rookie scoring in the entire league, behind Peter Forsberg and Paul Kariya. His 16 goals also led the team, so I would count this as a fairly successful rookie year. While he didn’t get any Calder votes, only four players did that year, so it isn’t exactly a blowing indictment on his performance.

Oliver would go on to have a successful second season, with 20 goals and 39 points in 80 games, although he would then only score 13 goals and 29 more points in the next 109 games.

Marc-Andre Bergeron, 2003–04

While the next year Bergeron would go from hero to zero in the Stanley Cup Final and live in infamy among Oilers fans, his rookie season was arguably one of the best for an Oilers defenceman.

He scored nine goals and 26 points in just 54 games, which would be almost 14 goals and 39 points over an 82 game season. To put that in perspective, the Oilers rookie record for goals is 13 (Tom Gilbert) and points is 35 (Riisto Siltanen).

He led the team defence in goals and finished second on the team defence in points to Steve Staios by just two points, despite Staios playing 28 more games.

He was third in the league in rookie defencemen scoring, behind John-Michael Liles (10 goals and 34 points in 79 games), and Joni Pitkanen (8 goals and 27 points in 71 games).

His performance earned him a single fourth place vote for the Calder Trophy, putting him 14th in voting.

The 2007–08 rookie class

Two years after coming within winning the Cup, the Oilers looked like they were in rebuild mode, having just picked Sam Gagner sixth overall. That team ended up surprising, though, finishing ninth in the Western Conference, just three points behind the eighth-place Nashville Predators.

That performance came in no small part to the slew of rookies the Oilers had that year.

Gagner led the way with 36 assists and 49 points in 79 games, which are currently the third and sixth best in team history respectively.

Andrew Cogliano was just behind him with 18 goals and 45 points, good for seventh and eighth place on the team record board.

Tom Gilbert led the team’s blueline as a rookie, scoring 13 goals, 20 assists, and 33 points. Those 33 points are second in franchise history behind Siltanen as mentioned above, and those 13 goals remain the benchmark for the team.

All three of Gagner, Cogliano, and Gilbert earned Calder consideration, finishing seventh, ninth, and 11th respectively.

There was actually another rookie on that team that played a big role in its success: the midseason acquisition Curtis Glencross, who put up nine goals and 13 points in just 26 games while playing on what was one of the best fourth lines this team ever saw.

Taylor Hall and Jordan Eberle, 2010–11

The first ever first overall pick for the Oilers had a fairly good rookie season, scoring 22 goals and 42 points in just 65 games. That put him just one point behind his fellow rookie, Jordan Eberle, who scored 18 goals and 43 points in 69 games to lead the team.

Hall is one of just five Oilers to score 20+ goals as a rookie, and currently sits fourth. Eberle and Hall are also in ninth and 10th position in points on the team’s leaderboard.

Both players got Calder votes, with Hall finishing nunth and Eberle 15th.

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, 2011–12

Ask any Oilers fan and they will tell you the same thing: Nuge should have won the Calder, full stop.

He led the NHL in rookie scoring with 18 goals and 52 points in just 62 games. The winner of the Calder was Gabriel Landeskog, who scored 22 goals and 52 points…but in 82 games. One is a 22-goal and 52-point pace over an entire season, while the other is a 24-goal and 69-point pace. One of the arguments made was that Landeskog did still score more goals, and so he technically did lead the scoring race because of that. He also led his team in goals, and had “intangibles.”

Sure, it is no guarantee that Nuge would have kept up that pace if he hadn’t gotten injured. However, he had 35 points in 38 games; I mean, the guy became the first ever 18-year-old to score five assists in a game, that has to count for something right?

In any event, Nugent-Hopkins still finished second in Calder voting, but he will always be first in Oilers fans’ hearts.

Nail Yakupov, 2012–13

So remember when we were told before that the tie-breaker in points should go to the higher goal scorer? Apparently that rule changed the next year, since the Oilers now had the player with the most goals and points as a rookie in Nail Yakupov, who scored 17 goals and 31 points in 48 games, while the Calder Trophy winner Jonathan Huberdeau had 14 goals and 31 points in 48 games.

Yakupov led the Oilers in goals, while Huberdeau led the Florida Panthers in nothing. The Oilers also finished nine points ahead of the Panthers, so an argument about helping their team would also assumedly go in Yakupov’s favour.

You would think Oilers fans would be just as up in arms about Yakupov’s Calder snub as they are about Nuge’s.

The thing is, while the final numbers look good (a 29-goal and 52-point pace over 82 games is certainly a good rookie season which would put Yakupov in the top five of the franchise’s history in both categories), the fact of the matter is that Yakupov’s totals were inflated by an end of season hot streak when the Oilers were already out of the playoffs.

He had six goals in his last three games, meaning that he had 11 goals and 25 points in 45 games before that. Not bad numbers by any means, but nothing crazy.

Granted, Yakupov was a streaky player throughout the season. He started hot with five goals and eight points in his first 10 games, followed that up with one goal and seven points in the next 22 games, then five goals and 10 points in the next 10 games, a three-game pointless streak and then that six-goal heater.

Huberdeau could be considered even more streaky, recording two five-game pointless streaks, one four-game pointless streak and another two three-game pointless streaks.

Maybe we should be more mad about this one? Especially since Yakupov wasn’t even a finalist, but instead finished fifth?

Connor McDavid, 2015–16

If Nuge was the year where an Oiler should have won despite getting injured, McDavid was the year that he definitely would have won if he hadn’t gotten injured.

With 48 points in just 45 games, McDavid is the only Oilers rookie to score over a point per game.

At the time of his injury, McDavid was leading the league in rookie scoring with 12 points in 13 games.

Right before he returned from his injury, he had fallen down to 19th place, 34 points behind league leader Artemi Panarin.

McDavid would then score 36 points in the team’s last 32 games, beating Panarin’s 31 points in 27 games. That means that, during the times they were healthy, McDavid outscored Panarin 48 to 42, albeit playing 45 games to 38 (although yes, Panarin’s per game pace was better during that span…but I thought that didn’t matter?).

McDavid would end up finishing fourth in rookie scoring, quite a feat given his injury, and was third in Calder voting.

Stuart Skinner, 2022–23

You may have forgotten given his recent performance, but there was a time that Oilers fans were heralding the arrival of Stuart Skinner and happily anointing him as the future in net.

That is because Skinner came into the league hot. He had a cup of tea in 2021–22, playing 13 games, going 6–6 with a 0.913 save percentage and a 2.62 GAA.

The next season saw the Oilers sign Jack Campbell to be their starter, while letting the young 23-year-old Skinner *ahem* stew until he was ready to take the ladle mantle from Soup Campbell.

Campbell’s less than stellar performance threw a wrench into those plans, but Skinner was up to the task. He played 50 games for the team that year, the most by any Oiler rookie goalie, winning 29 games (also the highest in franchise history), a 2.73 GAA (second lowest in franchise history), a 0.914 save percentage (second highest in franchise history), and 1,404 saves (highest in franchise history). He also had two assists, putting him ahead of five players who skated for the team that year and is second in franchise history for a rookie goalie behind Fuhr.

Skinner ended up finishing second in Calder voting to Matty Beniers. Both players have failed to live up to their rookie seasons so far though.

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Can Howard and Savoie add themselves to this list? If they do, will they become consistent producers towards a powerhouse contender a la Kurri and Anderson, or will they become footnotes like Oliver and Yakupov? Only time will tell, although Oilers fans are certainly hoping for the former.

Photo by Curtis Comeau/Icon Sportswire

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