It’s been three weeks since we last watched our beloved Oilers do their thing, and it goes without saying that our last memories before the break weren’t exactly sparkling or overly positive. Edmonton lost back-to-back games to Toronto and Calgary in horrifying fashion, which meant Wednesday’s matchup with the Ducks had an extra layer of importance. Unfortunately, the Oilers chose to do everything possible to not win the game, coughing up three separate leads en route to a 6-5 regulation loss.

After waiting all day to watch the Oilers’ first game back from the break, it sure was nice to see Jack Roslovic open the scoring on a nifty snapshot only 13 seconds into the first period after Matt Savoie found him lurking behind Anaheim’s defence. It was equally cool to watch Ryan Nugent-Hopkins extend the lead to 2-0 just under nine minutes later when he chipped a Connor McDavid centering pass up and over Lukas Dostal’s shoulder. In terms of strong starts, this was about as good as it’s been for Edmonton all season. Up two on the road? What wasn’t to like?

But almost as quickly as the Oilers built the lead, they let the Ducks up off the mat and back into the game. Two uncontested goals on the back of weak goaltending and shoddy defending erased the Oilers’ early work and put the result in Jeopardy. At the same time, it’s hard to be surprised at this point. We’ve watched the pendulum swing back and forth from brilliance to disaster so many times this season that a stretch of structurally sound Oilers hockey would almost feel unsettling. Would it feel like home with the shift-by-shift chaos? All I know for sure is that, for as excited as we all were about the start, it didn’t take long for that feeling to be replaced by the same familiar annoyance and rage. We are so back.

The even dumber thing about Wednesday’s game was that we got to live out the same storyline twice. For the second time, the Oilers built a two-goal lead in just over a minute on the back of markers by Zach Hyman and Evan Bouchard, only to give the advantage away in under a minute to kick off the third period. Two separate two-goal leads and a one-goal lead for good measure all got erased by poor puck management, an awful night by Tristan Jarry, and a Ducks team that did a fantastic job of taking advantage of mistakes. If the Oilers gave them an inch, the Ducks took all the space they needed to climb back into tie games and make our side look ridiculous.

Despite leading three times in the hockey game, the 2025-26 Oilers are masters at finding ways to lose. Whether you want to hang this one on a dreadful five-goal-against, .800 save percentage performance by Tristan Jarry, or the laundry list of mistakes that led to beating him in the first place, it’s hard to feel good about the way this team handles adversity. Instead of flexing any killer instinct, they fold like a cheap tent in light breeze. Not only was this loss another missed opportunity, but it proved costly, as the Ducks leapt over Edmonton in the standings. You’d think five goals would be enough to win, but when your defence and goaltending are as porous as they are right now, no lead is safe when you’re as fragile as the Oilers seem to be right now. The good news is that the best way to feel better about yourself is to cough up leads and lose in the most embarrassing way possible.

For the first time since January 6th, when he suffered a broken finger against the Nashville Predators, Adam Henrique was back in the lineup on the third line between Vasily Podkolzin and Trent Frederic. Not exactly an offensive juggernaut of a line, you know? Yet, with 16 goals between them (Podz has 12 btw), this new third line needed to show it had some juice. And when Henrique spoke to Gregor a few days ago, they discussed his lack of offensive production and what he wanted to do to fix it. Unsurprisingly, it starts with keeping things simple.

At $3 million and with a full NMC, Henrique is a player that the Oilers desperately need to get going. Even though he’s averaging roughly three minutes less per night this season than his career average, the two goals and 10 points through his first 43 games leave plenty of room for improvement. As much as he told Jason he wants to get going offensively, the Oilers literally need him to. Unfortunately, game 44 wasn’t much different. In 12:42 of TOI, Rico finished with no shots, one hit, and a 54.5% success rate in the dot. I guess Rico’s offensive comeback tour will have to wait another day.

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