Welcome to my annual player review series, where I dive into the Edmonton Oilers season player-by-player. We’ll look back at the season that was, what kind of impact each player had, and what we could see from them next season. You can read about the analytics behind my analysis here.
Time waits for no man, and this year, it finally caught up to Derek Ryan. At 38 years old, the gas tank hit empty.
Ryan started the year on the Oilers roster playing in 31 of Edmonton’s first 36 games, and while his individual impacts all remained strong, his underlying numbers began to take a hit. Once a shining light in terms of being a strong analytical player, that wasn’t so much the case this season.
Still, there were areas he remained effective — namely in the faceoff dot, winning 61.2 percent of his draws — and his individual game, particularly defensively. Ryan was still contributing offence at a two percent rate above league average offensively and a 10 percent rate above league average defensively, according to HockeyViz, but with his boots slowing down, it became clear there wasn’t a regular spot in the Oilers lineup anymore.
Ryan would land on waivers and head to Bakersfield in the middle of January, getting recalled for two games in March and another in April, marking what very well might be his last NHL games.
His story to get to the NHL — let alone have a 600-game career – is simply remarkable, considering he never played his first NHL game until the 2015-16 season at 29 years old. He arrived in Edmonton in 2021-22 as a player the team really needed: a defensively reliable, right-shot, fourth-line centre. Over the four years in Edmonton he appeared in 261 games, the most for any NHL club, scoring 29 goals and 60 points.
DEREK RYAN’S CAREER SO FAR
| Regular Season | Playoffs | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Season | Team | Lge | GP | G | A | Pts | PIM | +/- | GP | G | A | Pts | PIM |
2003-04 | Spokane Chiefs | WHL | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
2004-05 | Spokane Chiefs | WHL | 71 | 14 | 32 | 46 | 39 | -11 | — | — | — | — | — |
2005-06 | Spokane Chiefs | WHL | 72 | 24 | 37 | 61 | 50 | -6 | — | — | — | — | — |
2006-07 | Spokane Chiefs | WHL | 72 | 28 | 31 | 59 | 50 | -2 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 2 |
2006-07 | Kalamazoo Wings | UHL | 3 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 13 | 4 | 1 | 5 | 8 |
2007-08 | U. of Alberta | CWUAA | 28 | 11 | 14 | 25 | 20 | 4 | |||||
2008-09 | U. of Alberta | CWUAA | 25 | 16 | 19 | 35 | 16 | 17 | |||||
2009-10 | U. of Alberta | CWUAA | 28 | 14 | 25 | 39 | 30 | 6 | |||||
2010-11 | U. of Alberta | CWUAA | 28 | 17 | 30 | 47 | 18 | 25 | |||||
2011-12 | Szekeshfehervar Alba Volan HC | Austria | 50 | 25 | 24 | 49 | 20 | 3 | 6 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 6 |
2012-13 | VSV EC | Austria | 54 | 27 | 39 | 66 | 22 | 7 | 3 | 8 | 11 | 6 | |
2013-14 | VSV EC | Austria | 54 | 38 | 46 | 84 | 50 | ||||||
2014-15 | Orebro HK | SweHL | 55 | 15 | 45 | 60 | 18 | 18 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
2015-16 | Charlotte Checkers | AHL | 70 | 23 | 32 | 55 | 24 | 5 | — | — | — | — | — |
2015-16 | Carolina Hurricanes | NHL | 6 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 1 | — | — | — | — | — |
2016-17 | Charlotte Checkers | AHL | 9 | 5 | 8 | 13 | 0 | 4 | — | — | — | — | — |
2016-17 | Carolina Hurricanes | NHL | 67 | 11 | 18 | 29 | 22 | -8 | — | — | — | — | — |
2017-18 | Carolina Hurricanes | NHL | 80 | 15 | 23 | 38 | 28 | -15 | — | — | — | — | — |
2018-19 | Calgary Flames | NHL | 81 | 13 | 25 | 38 | 24 | 21 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
2019-20 | Calgary Flames | NHL | 68 | 10 | 19 | 29 | 10 | 9 | 10 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 0 |
2020-21 | Calgary Flames | NHL | 43 | 2 | 11 | 13 | 16 | 6 | — | — | — | — | — |
2021-22 | Edmonton Oilers | NHL | 75 | 10 | 12 | 22 | 8 | -4 | 15 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |
2022-23 | Edmonton Oilers | NHL | 80 | 13 | 7 | 20 | 28 | 11 | 11 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 0 |
2023-24 | Edmonton Oilers | NHL | 70 | 5 | 7 | 12 | 8 | -3 | 19 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 8 |
2024-25 | Edmonton Oilers | NHL | 36 | 1 | 5 | 6 | 12 | -4 | — | — | — | — | — |
2024-25 | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 13 | 3 | 5 | 8 | 2 | -10 | — | — | — | — | — |
NHL Totals | 606 | 82 | 127 | 209 | 158 | 60 | 3 | 7 | 10 | 14 |
OTHER PLAYER REVIEWS
Zach Laing is Oilersnation’s associate editor, senior columnist, and The Nation Network’s news director. He also makes up one-half of the DFO DFS Report. He can be followed on Twitter, currently known as X, at @zjlaing, or reached by email at zach.laing@bettercollective.com.
