Connor McDavid has had his fair share of NHL head coaches.

From Todd McLellan, to Ken Hitchcock, to Dave Tippett, to Jay Woodcroft, and Kris Knoblauch.

Every coach, at least the last three, has failed to complete one crucial task: hold the Edmonton Oilers captain and other top players to account.

That’s why he and the leadership group, Leon Draisaitl and Zach Hyman, pushed for the team to hire Mike Babcock, something that became official Tuesday. So much so that McDavid is ready to take the brunt of the heat that Babcock is known all too well to deliver on his players.

“We brought Babs in to be hard on me. And Leon. The top guys — that’s who we want to point the finger at,” McDavid told Sportsnet’s Mark Spector in an exclusive interview. “As the leaders of the team, we are always taking the temperature of the room and assessing things. Of course we’re always watching.

“All I can speak to is him being our head coach today, and we want Babs to come in and be hard on Leon and Nuge and Boosh and Ecky and Heisy, and me. We want to push those guys, and we want him lifting up everybody else. That’s what he’s here to do.”

The concept of the leadership group being able to “control” Babcock, as had been speculated upon late last week, suddenly makes more sense. Point the finger at me,

Time and time again, the Oilers have struggled to find ways to maximize the depth of their roster. It’s left them short of being a “true team,” as when the going got tough, McDavid and Leon Draisaitl would be asked to get going. The ice time would climb, and players would be left on the outside with their ice time sliding.

McLellan, Hitchcock, Tippett, Woodcroft — beyond his early days — and Knoblauch all fell into the trap. But Babcock won’t.

“The definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again, and expecting a different result,” McDavid told Spector. “Babs is different. He gives us a different personality, a different approach to our group, and an approach that we’ve probably have never had.

“We’ve tried it the same way for a really long time. Let’s try it different.”

Never one to put much weight into the litany of individual awards McDavid has collected over his years — six Art Ross Trophies, five Ted Lindsay’s, three Hart’s, a Rocket Richard and a Conn Smythe — he continued to sing that tune to Spector.

There’s only one trophy on his mind these days: the Stanley Cup.

“There’s not much we can prove in the regular season, there’s just not,” said McDavid. “What’s another scoring title? A Hart or a Lindsay? you know, it’s all nice stuff, but the only thing we have left to prove is that we can put it all together.

“We’ve tried it one way for a really long time, and we got close. We got very close. We’re looking for the last 1 per cent.”

And if McDavid were to sit on the bench on a bad night, he told Spector, “It’s time to have that happen in Edmonton.”

Zach Laing is Oilersnation’s managing editor and The Nation Network’s news director. He can be followed on X at @zjlaing, or reached by email at zach.laing@bettercollective.com.