Have you heard? The NHL’s trade deadline is in two-and-a-half weeks and the Oilers are on the outside of a playoff spot by a large margin. Of course you’ve heard. The Oilers’ strategy when it comes to navigating through the deadline is the biggest story surrounding the team right now.

But after a commanding win against the Tampa Bay Lightning, arguably the best team in the league right now, there’s a faint amount of cautious optimism surrounding the Oilers. The climb is huge. Like, in the realm of technically mathematically possible but extremely unlikely.

The complicated thing with that optimism, though, is the long-term ramifications of going on a late-season run. That brings us to this week’s What Would You Do Wednesday question. What does a successful finish to this incredibly frustrating and disappointing season look like? And, beyond that, how should the team approach the trade deadline and the months after it?

I think the question ultimately comes down to this: tank or don’t tank. But maybe there’s a middle ground?

The Oilers are 12 points out of a playoff spot right now. They have to jump over three of Los Angeles, Anaheim, San Jose, and Calgary to grab one of the playoff spots in the Pacific Division.

That’s obviously a tall task, but are those teams that much better than the Oilers? The Sharks and Kings can’t score, the Ducks have struggled with injuries and lack depth, and the Flames’ blueline looks surprisingly bad and they’ve been riding 36-year-old Mike Smith’s career season. Edmonton also has 11 games left against those four teams, which creates an excellent opportunity to make up ground quickly.

It’s easy to say that this is completely impossible and that the team should pack in, give up, and worry about next season. The odds are ridiculously low, the team is deeply flawed, and not selling at the trade deadline would be a massive mistake.

But isn’t the point of this whole thing to try to win? Games against Tampa Bay make you realize that this team isn’t as far away as their losses against Buffalo indicate. This is still largely the group that eclipsed the 100-point plateau last season and came within a goal of reaching the Western Conference Final.

Driving hard to the finish line will help management determine who should stick around and who shouldn’t. Also, even if they come up just short, it could give the group motivation and confidence heading into the off-season knowing that they have the ability to be one of the league’s better teams.

The Oilers need to go something like 21-7-3 in their final 31 games to make the playoffs. That’s a 0.725 possible points percentage for the rest of the season, which is better than the 0.708 percentage the league-leading Lightning have operated at this year. The Oilers haven’t had a winning streak longer than four games this season.

While beating Tampa Bay handily was cool and reminded us that the team can actually be really good, it doesn’t mean they’re going to play that well night in, night out the rest of the season. For every pounding of the Lightning, there’s a 5-0 loss to Buffalo to offset it. That’s been the story of this season.

The Oilers have a completely barren prospect cupboard and an unenviable cap situation. According to Craig Button’s list, Edmonton doesn’t even have a prospect in the top 50. Even if you think Kailer Yamamoto should be on that list, it’s hard to argue the Oilers have anything worthwhile behind him.

Not only could the team use a talent from the top of the draft like Brady Tkachuk, Filip Zadina, or Andrei Svechnikov (or, hell, if the lottery balls fell in the Oilers’ favour — Rasmus Dahlin), they could also use some depth in the system. The Oilers have only had one second round pick in the previous four drafts, which was used on the oft-injured Tyler Benson. This is supposed to be a very deep draft, so dealing impending free agents like Patrick Maroon to acquire more draft picks could be huge for the long-term success of the team.

Another important thing to consider when it comes to tanking is the altered draft lottery odds. The league has made the draft lottery significantly more random in an attempt to try to stop teams from actively losing. If you finish last overall, you only have an 18 per cent chance at the first overall pick. Last spring, we saw New Jersey (27th), Philadelphia (19th), and Dallas (24th) all jump into first, second, and third respectively, while Colorado picked fourth overall after their hilariously bad season.

The Oilers simply aren’t bad enough to catch teams like Arizona and Buffalo for dead last in the league. Even if they dealt impending free agents like Patrick Maroon, Mark Letestu, and Mike Cammalleri, the team is still too good to collapse to the bottom of the league.

But if they trade those players to recoup draft assets, they might still be good enough to go on a run. If the team is going to somehow climb up the standings, it’ll be on the back of Connor McDavid playing ridiculously well with Leon Draisaitl on his wins, Cam Talbot being rock solid in net, and the blueline being as good as it can be.

Maybe the Oilers can sell at the trade deadline, but also buy here and there too. Back in 2015, Peter Chiarelli pulled off one of his best moves as Oilers general manager by grabbing Maroon as a cap dump from the Anaheim Ducks. Maybe there’s another acquisition to be made, like Josh Leivo in Toronto for example, along with a Maroon sell that can accomplish two things at once. The Oilers end up with not only future draft picks or prospects for selling a good rental asset, but also a player capable of filling in for a short-term improbable run and long-term on the team in that same role.

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