Here is a glance at the results of Edmonton’s three defensive pairings at this point of the season:

These are certainly some fascinating results, and perhaps even inspire some hope. Indeed, Nurse has struggled with Walman, and his results with Statsney are even worse; however, he has posted positive xGoal% results with each of the other four defencemen.

Firstly, Nurse – Regula has been the most commonly deployed second-pair this season. On the one hand, they have been horrendously out-scored 6 to 17, equating to an ugly 26 percent goal share. But on the other hand, their possession and chance numbers are positive. The primary reason for the pair’s low GF% was an extremely low four percent on-ice shooting percentage and 0.862 on-ice save percentage; though the pairing has been split up, they almost certainly would have improved over a larger sample.

Nextly, Nurse has most recently been deployed next to Ty Emberson, and though the sample is small thus far, the results have been quite good, with a 56 percent xGoal%. Certainly quite encouraging.

Nurse has also put up fantastic results in limited minutes with Bouchard, and in terms of possession, this isn’t anything new. They have a 62 xG% in over 330 minutes in the prior three seasons. But that being said, there are some caveats to note here.

Firstly, much of the time the two have played together has been right after a PK alongside McDavid and Draisaitl; as a full-time pairing, they haven’t played as consistently. And when they have played together as a full-time pair, they have often produced a poor actual goal differential as a pair in the past, most notably when they were paired together at the start of the 2025 playoffs. A big reason for this is that both of them can struggle to defend the cycle and can be prone to making critical errors, leading to high-quality GA. Perhaps it is worth giving them a much larger sample to see what they can truly do, and they absolutely could succeed, but I have some doubts.

And finally, Nurse also has strong metrics next to Ekholm. Of course, it’s only about 48 minutes, but even in the 160 minutes they have spent in the prior three seasons, their xGoal% is at 60 percent. Considering that Ekholm did put up solid numbers at RD in Nashville, this could be a viable option with potential.

All things considered, there are several options for what the Oilers could do with the current defensive core.

Firstly, they could stay put with what they have right now: Ekholm – Bouchard, Nurse – Emberson, and Walman – Stastney. If Nurse and Emberson can sustain their results, this is a good defensive core; however, that is a big “if.” While Emberson has been a solid defensive player for the Oilers, it is highly questionable if he can be a long-term solution in the top four heading into the playoffs.

Secondly, they could try a top-pair of Nurse – Bouchard, allowing them to then have Ekholm and Walman either play together as a second-pair, or have each of them anchor their own pairings. This is an option with potential and could balance the top four. But, this is heavily dependent on the potential performance of Nurse – Bouchard and if they can sustain a strong goal differential as a full-time pair.

Finally, and perhaps the most intruiging option option here, is to try pairings of Walman – Bouchard, Nurse – Ekholm, and Statsney – Emberson. If Ekholm can help to stabilize Nurse’s defensive game on the right side, I could easily see the Oilers having great success with these pairs.

Even giving Nurse – Walman another opportunity together is not a terrible idea. They did have strong results together in limited minutes last season, and perhaps their results this season have been due to injuries.

All-in-all, with a healthy Walman, the Oilers do have several deployment options with their defensive core. We’ll see what the coaching staff ultimately decides to do.

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