There’s a lot to unpack when Edmonton Oilers’ coach Kris Knoblauch says he plans on having Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl play together, not as his 1C and 2C to start the season and, forgive us if we hesitate to hold the boss at his word with all the machinations with 97 and 29 over the years.

After all it’s Sept. 23, not opening night Oct. 8.

But, the reasoning may be as simple as this.

(1)The Oilers need to get off to a good team start after stumbling badly out of the gate the past two seasons, starting 0-3 last October (outscored 15-3), and going so badly in 2023 that Jay Woodcroft (3-9-1) got canned for Knoblauch. The nuclear option is usually deployed at 5-on-5 for McDavid and Draisaitl when Oilers are sucking exhaust early in games or when they are trying to climb out of a hole in the last 20 minutes so you put two of the three best offensive players in the world (Nate MacKinnon is the other), together. But, Knoblauch is the W business, especially to kick things off.

(2) With first-line right wing Zach Hyman missing at least the first month, 12 games, recovering from surgery in June to repair his dislocated right wrist, along with some ligaments, there’s clearly not enough offensive pop there for Knoblauch unless we have the 97-29 symbiotic relationship at even-strength, and not just on the PP.

(3) Knoblauch has the easy fallback to play Ryan Nugent-Hopkins as second-line centre, which he says he’ll do even if there’s been more talk of the longest-serving Oilers player maybe being third-line centre for his two-way game, with the coach wanting to build a checking line with some truculence, ergo Trent Frederic there, somewhere.

For Wednesday’s game here against Seattle Kraken, Frederic draws the first heavenly assignment of being right wing with McDavid and Draisaitl, the go-to-the-net like Hyman, although he doesn’t have Zach’s hands, clearly. We’ll see if Frederic with the pitch-and-catch 97 and 29, is too much to process, but camp is all about experimenting, right?

It says here that Andrew Mangiapane still has the inside track to be on RW with McDavid and Draisaitl, not Frederic, because he was signed as a support offensive guy. It also says here that Adam Henrique could be the third-line centre, not Nugent-Hopkins, although at 35 Henrique doesn’t skate as well as he once did and there’s a lot more skating north-south for a centre, helping out the defence in the defensive zone, than as a winger, but Henrique is the Oilers second best face-off man after Draisaitl.

Where Czech-born David Tomasek fits in all of this is a major question. For the game against the Kraken he’ll be at centre, where he won the Swedish Hockey League scoring title last season, not force-fed, learn-on-the-fly wing duty. It’s always good to have a right-shot centre in the top six, so we’ll see. It’s also unclear where the recently extended Vasily Podkolzin fits now since he’s been Draisaitl’s LW most of last season. Is he automatically on Nugent-Hopkins LW when the season starts?

Again, Knoblauch may decide, after camp, it still makes more sense to have 97 with Nugent-Hopkins on left wing, as usual, and 29 with Podkolzin, as usual. And he’s careful to say, his studs are good together or apart. But, for now, the head coach is leaning to throwing all of his chips into the pot.

It’s all about Hyman being out, of course, and taking up his normal right-wing slot with McDavid. It’s thrown things out of whack for the coach, so by playing Connor and Leon together, it’s not just the path of least resistance, it’s an obvious safety net.  Heck, we even saw Connor and Leon killing penalties together Monday, with the coach saying that’s also a possibility late in a penalty kill, so when it ends they’re out there 5-on-5.

“Without Zach we’re a little slim in top-six winger talent,” said Knoblauch. “And maybe you have pieces that you don’t really like. But with Connor and Leon together I really like that, no matter who else is on that line with them. It just works. Right now, it’s Freddy. We want to see what everyone else  brings, how other guys mesh.”

When Hyman returns, then Knoblauch can start experimenting with his top six. Of course there’s never anything written in pen with 97 and 29. It’s always pencil, with an eraser. Together, apart, together for a period, a game? Centering their own lines?

Knoblauch says the plan is to have McDavid, who has 1,082 career points, and Draisaitl, just 44 points away from 1,000, as linemates at even strength.

“When they are playing together you get a lot more out of the other three lines,” said Knoblauch. “That might sound a little ironic, but it’s the ice-time available when Connor and Leon are playing 21, 22 minutes (a night). There’s not much left for the others on lines three and four. They feel left out. But when they’re playing together it allows the other three lines to play more to their identity, whether that’s a checking line, an energy line. Maybe a guy who’s not a top-six guy but finds himself with Connor or Leon, he feels he has to play to that identity even though that’s not part of their game.”

“I just feel that maybe you get more out of the other guys. We saw that last year when Nugent-Hopkins was playing with (Viktor) Arvidsson and Podkolzin. They were able to play their games more,” said Knoblauch.

Why Frederic with the top dogs?  At first blush, it seems a bit of a reach — he had 17- and 18-goal highs in Boston — but maybe not. Podkolzin’s able to play with Draisaitl, and while he’s a demon at keeping pucks alive, working the boards, he had eight goals last season, and Leon is the head of his fan club.

“Obviously we’re missing Zach for the first month and we need somebody to move up, maybe top line. Freddy never had a chance to play top line (in Boston) ever. But Freddy doesn’t get enough credit or appreciation for his skills. He is good with the puck. The two most important attributes playing with Connor and Leon is work along the walls, breaking the puck out, getting it in their hands. The other part is being around the net. Look at the success Zach’s had there. We think Freddy could do that, too.”

Yeah, you’re about ask about Matt Savoie in the top six, somewhere, right?

Or does Knoblauch soft-sell the 21-year-old, for now?

The latter, it seems. And it says here, that that’s the right call.

“We want him to be put in a position to have success and we can always move him up in the lineup. There’s going to be bad games, stretches where he’s not playing his best. At times, we may feel we can move him down but I think it’s best he starts low and moves up,” said Knoblauch.

“Even if he’s on the fourth line, I can see him on special teams. Being on the penalty-kill, maybe the PP. If he’s on the top line, plus special teams, that’s probably too tall an order for a guy coming into the league. We need secondary scoring … we didn’t have enough of that last year and if he can do that on a lower line, that’s good,” said Knoblauch.

And the wild-card Tomasek? Maybe it’s also time to slow walk his NHL role, too.

Maybe he’s not a top-six, maybe he’s a third-liner?

“Right now it’s best Tomasek plays the position he’s most familiar and that’s centre, where he’s been the last two years. Best to get used to the game here in the middle,” said Knoblauch.

“He was one of the top face-off guys in his league last year. It’s not the NHL but that’s a good start. He’s strong and we think he can be a faceoff guy for us. We’re not counting on it now but we feel we can rely on him, maybe in the last minute, if it’s on his side for face-offs.”

Only one given for Knoblauch in his deck of cards.

When he has 97 and 29 together, the other team is in major trouble.

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