All year long, teams and leagues have been announcing their top players from the first 25 years of the 21st century, as voted on by fans. And once again, the Edmonton Oilers have a few names to boast.
On Tuesday, the Ontario Hockey League put out their West Division Quarter Century Team, with Darnell Nurse and former Oilers first-overall pick Taylor Hall landing on the First Team.
Hall played three years with the Windsor Spitfires, finishing second on the franchise’s all-time goalscoring list with 123 tucks. He had 280 points in 183 games played with the team, positioning him as a top prospect heading into the 2010 NHL entry draft. Hailing from Calgary, the 33-year-old is the only Alberta native between the two Quarter Century Teams.
Led by Hall’s impressive point totals, the Windsor Spitfires won their division and back-to-back OHL Championships in 2009 and 2010. Hall registered 76 points in 44 career OHL playoff games. They went on to win a franchise-first Memorial Cup in 2009 and defended the title in 2010, with Hall putting up 7 goals and 17 points through the two tournaments. In the 2009-10 season, he finished tied for the league lead in points with Tyler Seguin, both finishing with 106, although Hall did so with six fewer games played.
Hall’s production slowed somewhat after he made the jump to the NHL, with 328 points in 381 games played with a then-struggling Oilers team over six seasons. He was traded to the New Jersey Devils before Edmonton made their first playoff appearance in a decade in 2017.
Nurse meanwhile played with the Soo Greyhounds from 2011-2015, putting up 134 points in 221 games played. A leader on the blue line, Nurse was the team captain for his final two years with the team, after first serving as alternate captain in his sophomore season. With the ‘C’ on his jersey, he led the team to their first back-to-back West division trophies, including picking up the Hamilton Spectator Trophy for the league lead in points in 2015, as they finished with an impressive 54-12-2 record.
The Ontario native was drafted seventh overall by the Oilers in the 2013 NHL draft, and has since played 716 games with the franchise, earning his 300th career point this season. Still a natural-born leader, the 30-year-old has served as Edmonton’s alternate captain for six years now under Connor McDavid.

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