Two things can be true at once.
It’s far too soon to give up on Stuart Skinner, he’s still only 26 years old. Also, the Oilers need to get better goaltending if they’re going to win the Stanley Cup. 
Now, for those who are hoping that the Oilers move on from Skinner before the March 7 trade deadline, you’re likely going to be disappointed. In a recent episode of Daily Faceoff Live, Frank Seravalli noted that Oilers general manager Stan Bowman said that the team doesn’t need a goalie. The full quote below:
“I taped the Frankly Speaking episode with Stan Bowman on Friday that’ll drop on Wednesday, and he said point blank that they don’t need to add a goalie. And beyond that, they’re hoping they can get an answer on Evander Kane’s health by March 1st to be able to make the appropriate decisions by next Friday.”
There are merits to trusting Skinner in the stretch run. The Edmonton native broke onto the scene in 2022-23, outdueling Jack Campbell for the starters’ spot and posting a .914 save percentage and 2.73 goals against average in 50 games.
However, Skinner had a rough start to the season with an .854 save percentage and a 1-5-1 over his first eight games. He turned it around over his last 51 games though, finishing with a 35-11-4 record with a .913 save percentage.
Skinner had a rough 2024 post-season, right? Well, kind of, as he finished with a .901 save percentage and 2.45 goals against average in 23 games played. A big reason for that is the first three games against the Vancouver Canucks, where he allowed 12 goals on 58 shots for a .793 save percentage.
However, when you remove those three games from the 23-game sample size, Skinner had a respectable .913 save percentage in the remaining 20 games. He was great in the Western Conference Final against the Dallas Stars, posting a .922 save percentage and outdueled Sergei Bobrovsky in the Stanley Cup Finals, finishing with a .909 save percentage in seven games.
History repeated itself in 2024-25. Although the Oilers got out of their early season slump much sooner than in the 2023-24 season, Skinner’s play wasn’t particularly good over his first 14 games, posting an .876 save percentage. With that being said, over his past 24 games, Skinner has a .911 save percentage and 2.50 goals against average with a 14-7-2 record.
A counter-argument is that Skinner has had a rough February, posting an .876 save percentage and 3.33 goals against average in nine games, with a 4-4-1 record. Another argument is that Skinner’s numbers aren’t great against teams fighting for a postseason spot. Against the other 15 teams in the postseason + the Columbus Blue Jackets, Boston Bruins, New York Rangers, and Calgary Flames, Skinner has an .892 save percentage. The Oilers as a whole have struggled against the best teams, giving up far too many high-quality chances.
Of course, save percentage, goals against average, and records don’t tell the whole story. For netminder with a minimum of 18 games played, Skinner’s Goals Saved Above Expected comes in at -2.9, 11th-worst in a sample size of 53 goalies. Even more worrisome is Calvin Pickard’s -6.5 GSAE, seventh-worst.
What about the eye test though? For this, I picked a random clip. It happened to be Kevin Hayes’ goal on Jan. 9 to make it 3-0. Simply put, what the hell is Skinner supposed to do here? In full transparency, the second clip I looked at was this one from Dec. 16 against the Florida Panthers, a save Skinner needed to have.
Let’s look at the goals in Skinner’s most recent starts. The first goal was scored by Matvei Michkov. There was turnover at the blue line by Evan Bouchard, the Oilers played poor transitional defence, a bad bounce off the boards, and no one covering Michkov led to a goal. Skinner hesitated ever so slightly, but this would’ve been a tough save regardless.
Goal #2 was early in the second period from Owen Tippett. Brett Kulak was burnt by speed leading to a partial breakaway, but he and Darnell Nurse played the middle of the ice, forcing Tippett to one side. He used his backhand to beat Skinner. It’s one he should’ve saved, but a player that shouldn’t have even happened.
The third goal was in no way Skinner’s fault, as the Oilers turned the puck over and a Flyer was all alone on the backdoor. Sure, Sean Couturier shot it right off Skinner and it bounced in, but a goalie needing to move across the crease to save a shot from the open man is never his fault.
Another turnover led to bad transitional defence, leading to an odd-man rush. Mattias Ekholm played it the best he could, same with Skinner, but the turnover should’ve never happened. Hard to blame Skinner on this one as well.
The fifth and final goal on Skinner was a tip from the slot. Two Oilers contested the shooter, Connor Brown was late to switch to Andrei Kuzmenko, and he had an easy deflection for the fifth goal of the game. You’d love a save here, but you’d also love the defence to be tighter.
You can look through most games Skinner plays and it’s almost nearly a similar situation. Yes, he allows his soft goals, yes, he needs to make a big save every once in a while, but the problem runs far deeper than Skinner. Turnovers and poor defence, especially against top teams, have been a common theme all season.
It’s not an unfair argument to say that the Oilers need a more experienced goalie such as John Gibson to bolster their chances of winning the Stanley Cup. However, it’s far too soon to give up on Skinner as he’s on a team-friendly contract and still has potential to reach. Ultimately, the Oilers just need to play better as they’ve shown that they’re capable of reaching to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final with Skinner in net.
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