The Edmonton Oilers continue their four-game road trip tonight with a stop in Pittsburgh to face the Penguins. It’s the Oilers’ lone visit to the Steel City as they look to close out the first half of the season on a five-game win streak.
  1. The Oilers have had plenty of success when visiting Pittsburgh lately. Edmonton has won the last four meetings at the PPG Paints Arena with their last loss coming in the 2018-19. The Penguins won 3-1 in 2019 but Leon Draisaitl did open the scoring for Edmonton.
  2. The headliner tonight isn’t necessarily the Edmonton Oilers vs Pittsburgh Penguins but, instead, Connor McDavid vs Sidney Crosby. McDavid has played against Crosby and the Penguins 15 times producing 9 goals and 27 points, which includes one game winner. Crosby, on the other hand, has faced the Oilers 24 times throughout his career scoring 5 goals and 22 points. One of those five goals was of course when he put Ryan Strome in a blend to give the Penguins an overtime victory.
  3. Heading into tonight’s contest, Pittsburgh has lost four games in a row with the last three all in overtime. In their last two games against the Carolina Hurricanes and Columbus Blue Jackets they held two goal leads before losing in overtime. The Blue Jackets win in Pittsburgh was their first since the 2015 season, which was a 15 game losing streak.
  4. Evgeni Malkin didn’t play against the Blue Jackets after being sidelined with an undisclosed injury. His absences ended a streak of 209 consecutive games played which extends back to the 2021-22 season. He’ll be a game-time decision for tonight’s contest.
  5. Pittsburgh has struggled to keep the puck out their net throughout the season. They’ve allowed 152 goals, which is the most goals against in the NHL, for an average of 3.62 against per game. Tristian Jarry has allowed 49 goals at 5-on-5 and has a goals saved above average of -10.31. For comparison, Stuart Skinner has allowed 51 in eight more games played and has a 1.09 GSAA.
  6. Skinner has been fantastic for the Oilers. Since December 1st, amongst goaltenders that have played 10 or more games, Skinner is 5th in save percentage with a 0.923SV% and 4th in goals against average with a 2.11. At 5-on-5, his GSAA is 5.05 (8th) and has only allowed 16 goals against. After his 26-save performance against Boston on Tuesday, Skinner’s save percentage has now risen above 900 on the season.
  7. Calvin Pickard has been reliable for the Oilers all season. However, his performances on the road are significantly better than at home. Pickard has the eighth-best save percentage on the road (0.921) which is better than Igor Shesterkin, Jacob Markstrom and Linus Ullmark. His notable games came against the Minnesota Wild (1 goal against and 30 saves), the Nashville Predators (1 goal against and 27 saves) and the Detroit Red Wings (2 goals against and 26 saves). Unfortunately, the results are drastically different at home where Pickard has a 0.853SV%. Recently, the results have been better for him but the loss against the New Jersey Devils and Chicago Blackhawks are still dragging his stats down.
  8. Leon Draisaitl had his 14-game point streak snapped in the 4-0 win over the Bruins earlier in the week. Over that time, from December 5th onward, nobody scored more goals than Draisaitl (12) or points (27). The Oilers superstars are still first in the NHL in goals with 29 and is second in points, behind Nathan Mackinnon, with 59.
  9. The only change to the lines tonight is that Troy Stecher is likely to replace Josh Brown on the blue line. Brown played 11 minutes and 49 seconds against Boston which was the fewest by an Oilers blueliner. He registered four hits and one shot on goal.