Philip Broberg and Dylan Holloway will join the St. Louis Blues after the Oilers declined to match offer sheets sent their way.
The Oilers made the news official Tuesday morning, seven days after St. Louis signed Philip Broberg to a two-year, $4,580,917-million offer sheet and Holloway to a two-year, $2,290,457-million offer sheet. As a result, Edmonton will receive a second-round and third-round pick in compensation for the two players, which is in line with the NHL’s offer sheet compensation guidelines.
In a separate transaction, the Oilers received a third-round pick in the 2028 draft and defenceman Paul Fischer, the Blues’ third-round pick in the 2023 draft.
Fischer, 19, just finished his first season at the NCAA’s University of Notre Dame, scoring two goals and 16 points in 34 games.
Edmonton signalled they likely wouldn’t be matching the offer sheets on Sunday, acquiring winger Vasily Podkolzin from the Vancouver Canucks for a fourth-round draft pick and defenceman Ty Emberson from the San Jose Sharks in exchange for Cody Ceci and a third-round pick.
The Oilers declining the offer sheets now means that all four first-round picks Ken Holland used to select players between 2019 and 2022 are no longer with the team. Broberg was chosen in the first round of the 2019 draft, Holloway in the 2020 draft, Xavier Bourgault in the 2021 draft, and Reid Schaefer in the 2022 draft.
The Oilers never handled Broberg’s development well, culminating in the 23-year-old requesting a trade last December. The Oilers held onto the rearguard, assigning him to the AHL’s Bakersfield Condors, where he enjoyed a breakout campaign scoring five goals and 38 points in 49 games. At the time, Broberg had only played in roughly half of the eligible games he could’ve in North America, having arrived in 2021. He returned to Edmonton late in the season, scoring two assists in two games, and came into the Oilers lineup, scoring two goals and three points in 10 games.
Holloway, meanwhile, had struggles of his own in the pro game, getting a slow start after dealing with a wrist injury when his playing days at the NCAA’s University of Wisconsin ended. Couple that with multiple injuries in each of his three seasons with the Oilers organization, and Holloway’s development has been stunted. Still, he scored six goals and nine points in 38 regular season games this year, adding five more goals and seven points in 25 playoff games, enjoying the best year of his pro career thus far.
The Oilers, simply put, decided these contracts were too rich for their cash-strapped blood. While moving out Ceci for Emberson helped clear up some cap space and position the team to potentially match the offer sheets, they decided against such a move. Now, they will enter the season with a different look on their blueline and some salary cap space to work with.
According to PuckPedia, they can carry a 21-man roster at the start of the season, be under the salary cap and accrue cap space ahead of the deadline. PuckPedia added that the team could add up with $4.4-million in cap hits while staying under the salary cap.

Zach Laing is the Nation Network’s news director and senior columnist. He can be followed on Twitter at @zjlaing, or reached by email at zach@thenationnetwork.com.

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