This in from NHL insider Frank Seravalli of Frankly Hockey, speaking to Bob Stauffer of Oilers Now, and letting it rip with a scathing critique of the current state of the Edmonton Oilers, a team with just 28 wins in its first 58 games.
“This team needs a real wake-up call,” Seravalli said. “Let’s just call a spade a spade. To me, Leon Draisaitl’s comments were pretty pointed. And it’s not that the coach needs to be singled out. I think the point is that it’s getting late earlier than you think. The Oilers are on track for 91 points this year. Something like that may be enough to make the playoffs, but it might not. And I think this team is in a tougher spot statistically, schedule-wise, and everything else than people might realize because there’s been a complacency here. I think from the players, from the coaching staff, from even at times an exasperated fan base that just says, ‘Oh, well, because they’ve gone to two straight Stanley Cup finals, this team will figure it out and will get it together and be a playoff team and then just flip the switch.’ And I’m here to tell you, like, that’s just not always how it works.”
Seravalli continued: “I think this team is waiting for something to happen. I don’t know if they’re waiting for a trade at this deadline. I don’t know if they’re waiting for the triumphant return of Paul Coffey on the bench. I don’t know what it is that this group specifically is longing for, but it’s pretty clear that status quo and continuing to pound your head against the wall is not going to be a recipe for success for this team this year.
“When you’re in 19th place and you have Stanley Cup aspirations, it’s not good enough. Like I said, the Oilers are on track for 91 points. That no one had that on their bingo card this year. And when you get to that place, it’s not one player, one person, one facet of the operation. It’s everything together. And I think that’s whether you want to look at it from one way or the other, whether it’s complacency or lack of urgency. I believe truly that that’s the root of the Oilers’ struggles and issues this season.”
Seravalli singled out the team’s mediocre defence, Darnell Nurse in particular. “Darnell Nurse is this team’s biggest problem, start and finish. Like, you could end it right there. At nine and a quarter million bucks, he needs to be an impact piece, and the Oilers are trying to survive in spite of him.”
He also said the team’s forward lines were a mess. “This is a thin team upfront that’s made thinner by the way that they’re deployed. There’s a very clear distinction between top six and bottom six. And I can see it both ways. I do have some sympathy for Kris Knoblauch and his coaching staff because they’re saying, ‘Someone step up and we’ll give you opportunity.’ And the answer from the players has been, ‘Well, we’re not getting any opportunity. How could we possibly show you something?’ … I think there’s some frustration that exists because I’m sure the coach feels like he doesn’t have the pieces required to win. I’m sure the players that aren’t seeing as much ice time feel like they’re not even given a chance. And then the stars are going, ‘Well, we can’t do it alone. So who’s it going to be?’ And around and around in a circle, we go.”
58 games
My take
1. Seravalli is one of the most connected reporters in the NHL, but he’s also an astute observer of teams and players. And he’s not given to making negative comments just because he’s an American and from the East, so he reflexively blasts western Canadian teams, the kind of nonsense we see now and then from Toronto and New York commentators.
If Seravalli makes a negative critique, it’s not knee jerk. He’s thought about the matter awhile, he’s studied the situation, and he’s giving his considered judgement in blunt language.
2. I’m much more optimistic about the Oilers than is Seravalli just now. I also think that while Nurse had been inconsistent this year, up and down, bad for a period, OK for a period, great for a period, the big d-man averages out this year as an OK-to-good player. He’s not the big problem on defence. The big problem is the defensive play of three struggling players, Jake Walman, Alec Regula and Spender Stastney.
It could be that Seravalli was mainly thinking of Nurse’s weak playoff play when making this critique. Nurse has indeed been a poor playoff performer four years straight. For Edmonton’s #25, this coming 2026 playoff season is the biggest test of his career.
3. That said, several parts of Seravalli’s scathing critique do hit the target. He’s right that the Oilers do seem complacent, and that urgency seems lacking. There’s no rush to develop the defensive habits and commitment to play the kind of high level defensive play the Oilers attained in their 2024 and 2025 Stanley Cup Final runs. In fact, the Oilers seem allergic to doing this kind of hard, dedicated work. They’d rather just ramp up the attack and try to win that way.
4. I do think that a team can suddenly start to play nasty physical hockey. We saw this last year when the Oilers were passive when it came to physical play for much of the 2024-25 regular season, but suddenly became hard-hitting beasts in the playoffs. But when it comes to defensive habits and commitment, it’s not nearly so easy to suddenly change. The Oilers, as a team, have never really played high level defence through an entire playoff series. They’ve done it in many playoff games, sometimes in as many as four or five games in any one series. But they’ve often slipped up in the playoffs on defence. They did so in too many games against Florida in both Finals. They gave away wins with poor defensive reads and habits. In this way, Seravalli is correct to point out this team’s lack of defensive discipline and to suggest you can’t simply fix such an issue all at once.
5. Are the Oilers waiting for something? I don’t know. But that something might just be the return of Paul Coffey. The sooner this happens, the better, I’ll suggest. I’ve been wanting to see it since early November. It seems like an obvious move to make. Why not do it?
At the Cult of Hockey
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