Captain Connor McDavid returned from injury on Wednesday and led the Edmonton Oilers to a 4-3 win over the St. Louis Blues with three points. The Oilers will be looking to build on that win when they host the last-place San Jose Sharks on Friday.
1. Despite their win over the Blues in regulation time earlier this week, the Oilers weren’t able to officially clinch a playoff berth because the Calgary Flames picked up a loser point against the Anaheim Ducks on the same night.
The Oilers are seven points up on the Flames for third place in the Pacific Division and both teams have four games left to play. Any sort of win by the Oilers combined with any type of loss by the Flames on Friday would ensure Calgary can’t jump Edmonton in the standings.
2. We already know that the Oilers will face the Los Angeles Kings in the first round of the playoffs for the fourth consecutive season later this month but we don’t know yet which team will be hosting.
The Kings are four points up on the Oilers and both teams have four games remaining. Los Angeles also won three of four meetings against Edmonton this season, giving them a key tiebreaker in the two teams finish the season with the same amount of wins and points.
3. The Sharks are well on their way to finishing dead last in the NHL standings for the second year in a row and they’re going to miss the playoffs for the sixth consecutive year. San Jose has a 20-47-11 record on the season, five points back of the Chicago Blackhawks in second last, and they’re on a seven-game losing streak.
The Sharks rank 30th in the league with 203 goals and they’re 32nd with 296 goals against. Their power play is 23rd at 18.9 percent and their penalty kill is 29th at 73.5 percent.
4. Though they’re still the worst team in the league on paper, this season has actually been an improvement for the Sharks over last year when they went 19-54-9.
The biggest bright spot in San Jose this season has been the rookie season of 2024 first-overall pick Macklin Celebrini. The 18-year-old forward leads the Sharks with 24 goals and 62 points in 66 games while logging an average of just under 20 minutes per night.
5. The Oilers have dominated the Sharks over the past few seasons. Between 2021-22 and 2024-25, Edmonton has gone 12-1-0 against San Jose, with the only loss coming during the team’s disastrous start to the 2023-24 season.
The two teams have only met twice so far this season. The Oilers squeezed out an overtime victory at home in December and they managed a 3-2 win in San Jose last week despite missing multiple key players to injury.
6. Three of the four games between the Oilers and Sharks this season were scheduled for April, so Edmonton is seeing an even less competitive version of San Jose than they would have earlier in the year.
The Sharks traded away Mikael Granlund, Cody Ceci, Fabian Zetterlund, and Jake Walman ahead of the March 7 deadline and they moved goaltender Mackenzie Blackwood to the Colorado Avalanche much earlier in the season.
7. The Oilers were undermanned when they beat the Blues earlier this week, playing with 12 forwards and five defencemen.
With Walman out because of an undisclosed injury, Brett Kulak, Darnell Nurse, and Evan Bouchard all played over 28 minutes. Walman is listed as day-to-day and it’s uncertain if he’ll suit up against his former team on Friday.
Goaltender Olivier Rodrigue was returned to the Bakersfield Condors on Thursday and defenceman Cam Dineen was called up from the team’s American Hockey League affiliate. We could see Stuart Skinner make his first start for the Oilers since suffering a concussion in a loss to the Dallas Stars back on March 26. At the very least, Skinner will be back on the bench as the backup against the Sharks.
