{"id":207222,"date":"2025-09-24T09:09:39","date_gmt":"2025-09-24T09:09:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/207222\/"},"modified":"2025-09-24T09:09:39","modified_gmt":"2025-09-24T09:09:39","slug":"oilers-to-start-season-with-nuclear-option-knoblauch-stacks-top-line-with-mcdavid-draisaitl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/207222\/","title":{"rendered":"Oilers to start season with nuclear option, Knoblauch stacks top line with McDavid, Draisaitl"},"content":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s a lot to unpack when Edmonton Oilers<\/a>\u2019 coach Kris Knoblauch says he plans on having Connor McDavid<\/a> 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.<\/p>\n

After all it\u2019s Sept. 23, not opening night Oct. 8.<\/p>\n

But, the reasoning may be as simple as this.<\/p>\n

(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.<\/p>\n

(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\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

(3) Knoblauch has the easy fallback to play Ryan Nugent-Hopkins as second-line centre, which he says he\u2019ll do even if there\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

For Wednesday\u2019s 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\u2019t have Zach\u2019s hands, clearly. We\u2019ll see if Frederic with the pitch-and-catch 97 and 29, is too much to process, but camp is all about experimenting, right?<\/p>\n

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\u2019t skate as well as he once did and there\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

Where Czech-born David Tomasek fits in all of this is a major question. For the game against the Kraken he\u2019ll be at centre, where he won the Swedish Hockey League scoring title last season, not force-fed, learn-on-the-fly wing duty. It\u2019s always good to have a right-shot centre in the top six, so we\u2019ll see. It\u2019s also unclear where the recently extended Vasily Podkolzin fits now since he\u2019s been Draisaitl\u2019s LW most of last season. Is he automatically on Nugent-Hopkins LW when the season starts?<\/p>\n

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\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s all about Hyman being out, of course, and taking up his normal right-wing slot with McDavid. It\u2019s thrown things out of whack for the coach, so by playing Connor and Leon together, it\u2019s not just the path of least resistance, it\u2019s an obvious safety net.\u00a0 Heck, we even saw Connor and Leon killing penalties together Monday, with the coach saying that\u2019s also a possibility late in a penalty kill, so when it ends they\u2019re out there 5-on-5.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout Zach we\u2019re a little slim in top-six winger talent,\u201d said Knoblauch. \u201cAnd maybe you have pieces that you don\u2019t 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\u2019s Freddy. We want to see what everyone else\u00a0 brings, how other guys mesh.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Hyman returns, then Knoblauch can start experimenting with his top six. Of course there\u2019s never anything written in pen with 97 and 29. It\u2019s always pencil, with an eraser. Together, apart, together for a period, a game? Centering their own lines?<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen they are playing together you get a lot more out of the other three lines,\u201d said Knoblauch. \u201cThat might sound a little ironic, but it\u2019s the ice-time available when Connor and Leon are playing 21, 22 minutes (a night). There\u2019s not much left for the others on lines three and four. They feel left out. But when they\u2019re playing together it allows the other three lines to play more to their identity, whether that\u2019s a checking line, an energy line. Maybe a guy who\u2019s not a top-six guy but finds himself with Connor or Leon, he feels he has to play to that identity even though that\u2019s not part of their game.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI 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,\u201d said Knoblauch.<\/p>\n

Why Frederic with the top dogs?\u00a0\u00a0At first blush, it seems a bit of a reach \u2014 he had 17- and 18-goal highs in Boston \u2014 but maybe not. Podkolzin\u2019s able to play with Draisaitl, and while he\u2019s a demon at keeping pucks alive, working the boards, he had eight goals last season, and Leon is the head of his fan club.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously we\u2019re 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\u2019t 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\u2019s had there. We think Freddy could do that, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yeah, you\u2019re about ask about Matt Savoie in the top six, somewhere, right?<\/p>\n

Or does Knoblauch soft-sell the 21-year-old, for now?<\/p>\n

The latter, it seems. And it says here, that that\u2019s the right call.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want him to be put in a position to have success and we can always move him up in the lineup. There\u2019s going to be bad games, stretches where he\u2019s not playing his best. At times, we may feel we can move him down but I think it\u2019s best he starts low and moves up,\u201d said Knoblauch.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven if he\u2019s on the fourth line, I can see him on special teams. Being on the penalty-kill, maybe the PP. If he\u2019s on the top line, plus special teams, that\u2019s probably too tall an order for a guy coming into the league. We need secondary scoring \u2026 we didn\u2019t have enough of that last year and if he can do that on a lower line, that\u2019s good,\u201d said Knoblauch.<\/p>\n

And the wild-card Tomasek? Maybe it\u2019s also time to slow walk his NHL role, too.<\/p>\n

Maybe he\u2019s not a top-six, maybe he\u2019s a third-liner?<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now it\u2019s best Tomasek plays the position he\u2019s most familiar and that\u2019s centre, where he\u2019s been the last two years. Best to get used to the game here in the middle,\u201d said Knoblauch.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was one of the top face-off guys in his league last year. It\u2019s not the NHL but that\u2019s a good start. He\u2019s strong and we think he can be a faceoff guy for us. We\u2019re not counting on it now but we feel we can rely on him, maybe in the last minute, if it\u2019s on his side for face-offs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Only one given for Knoblauch in his deck of cards.<\/p>\n

When he has 97 and 29 together, the other team is in major trouble.<\/p>\n

Related<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There\u2019s a lot to unpack when Edmonton Oilers\u2019 coach Kris Knoblauch says he plans on having Connor McDavid…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":207223,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5125],"tags":[1586,1824,16459,154,155,5862,198,146,5300,57,5,2854,370,4,24,15,234,1587,1588,1585],"class_list":{"0":"post-207222","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edmonton-oilers","8":"tag-adam-henrique","9":"tag-andrew-mangiapane","10":"tag-arvidsson","11":"tag-boston","12":"tag-connor-mcdavid","13":"tag-david-bloom","14":"tag-edmonton","15":"tag-edmonton-oilers","16":"tag-edmontonoilers","17":"tag-florida-panthers","18":"tag-hockey","19":"tag-kris-knoblauch","20":"tag-leon-draisaitl","21":"tag-nhl","22":"tag-oilers","23":"tag-ryan-nugent-hopkins","24":"tag-seattle-kraken","25":"tag-trent-frederic","26":"tag-vasily-podkolzin","27":"tag-zach-hyman"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115258495026099051","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}