Elliotte Friedman came out with his 31 Thoughts feature today and he discussed a couple of tidbits that might be of interest to fans of the Edmonton Oilers. One of them was in regards to vice-president of player development Scott Howson.

What to make of this? Not a hell of a lot. I imagine Ton Dundon contacted a pretty large list of hockey people for the general manager vacancy in Carolina and, given the fact he ended up going with Don Waddell formerly of the Atlanta Thrashers, he was interested in bringing somebody on board who had a terrible time with an expansion team.

Howson, as you might remember, got his start with the Oilers as he managed their AHL affiliate in Saint John and then Hamilton. He then got promoted to assistant general manager under Kevin Lowe between 2002 and 2007 before becoming the general manager of the Columbus Blue Jackets. He was fired in 2013 and returned to the Oilers as the Senior VP of Hockey Operations before pivoting to player development when the team hired Peter Chiarelli.

Anyways, there isn’t much to read into here. Though, if you put the first line of Friedman’s thought together the Oilers and Canes could perhaps have been discussing a Howson for Jeff Skinner swap. No? Ah, well, nevertheless. Enjoy your Friday!