Welcome back, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins.

The Nuge’s 2022-23 campaign was, in fact, huge. Career highs nearly across the board as the longest-serving Edmonton Oiler showed incredibly well in nearly every facet of the game and it’s pretty easy to call it a career year.

He pushed the pace of play offensively, was a vacuum defensively and was incredible on the Oilers’ record-setting power play. While his penalty kill numbers weren’t great in any sense of the term, the team’s penalty kill as a whole wasn’t great, so not too much fault can be placed at his feet.

The biggest question now is how does he respond and is he able to return with another 100-point season? With the roster the Oilers have and the fact he’ll be on the power play again, I’m not going to bet against it from happening. In the same breath, last year was a statistical anomaly of sorts for Nugent-Hopkins, and the smart money says the outlier seasons like last are typically difficult to repeat, especially for a player hitting 30-years-old.

At the end of the day, a 70-point season over 82 games would be most excellent for the lifer.