Throughout the summer and into the fall, we’ll be counting down the days until the Edmonton Oilers begin their 2023-24 season with a daily trip down memory lane. Today at No. 13 we have Andrew Cogliano, who owns the seventh-longest Ironman streak in NHL history.

Among the many changes agreed upon to end the 2004-05 NHL lockout was cutting down on the hooking and grabbing of opposing forwards by defencemen. The goal was to unlock more offence in the game and teams started favouring speed and skill over size and strength.

Edmonton’s first draft pick after the lockout reflected the NHL’s change in style. They selected Andrew Cogliano from the Ontario Junior Hockey League, a 5-foot-9 forward who was among the fastest skaters in the draft class.

General manager Kevin Lowe compared Cogliano to Todd Marchant, a small, speedy forward who played a big role on the Oilers in the late 90s and early 2000s. Cogliano mentioned after the Oilers selected him that he had become a fan of the team growing up due in part to Marchant’s overtime goal against the Dallas Stars in the 1997 playoffs.

Cogliano played for the University of Michigan in 2005-06 and 2006-07 and scored 28 points in 39 games as a freshman and 50 points in 38 games as a sophomore. He also won gold with Canada at the World Juniors in both 2006 and 2007.

Following their run to the Stanley Cup Final in 2005-06, the Oilers struggled mightily in 2006-07 and tanked out the final couple months of the season. They came back in 2007-08 with a new-look team highlighted by a trio of young forwards: Cogliano, sixth-overall pick Sam Gagner, and Robert Nilsson, who the Oilers acquired in the Ryan Smyth trade the previous season.

Cogliano suited up in all 82 games for the Oilers as a rookie and scored 18 goals and 45 points. While the Oilers were pushing for a playoff spot in March, Cogliano set an NHL record when he scored overtime-winning goals in three consecutive games against the Columbus Blue Jackets, Chicago Blackhawks, and St. Louis Blues, respectively.

Cogliano saw his offensive numbers decline in the next couple of seasons, as he scored 38 points in 2008-09 and 28 points in 2009-10. He signed a one-year, $1 million deal with the Oilers for the 2010-11 season and scored 35 points in 82 games. The Oilers dealt Cogliano to the Anaheim Ducks that following off-season in exchange for a second-round pick.

Over the next six seasons with the Ducks, Cogliano didn’t miss a single game. His Ironman streak that started when he made his debut with the Oilers in 2007 finally came to an end in January of 2018 at 830 consecutive games when he was suspended for two games for an interference call. Cogliano’s Ironman streak is the seventh longest in NHL history.

The Colorado Avalanche acquired Cogliano ahead of the trade deadline in 2021 and he helped the team win the Stanley Cup in the spring. He scored 19 points over 79 games for the Avs in 2022-23 and will be back with the team in 2023-24.