Let’s be real here, the Columbus Blue Jackets don’t have much of a history. They’ve never met the Edmonton Oilers in the postseason, even when they were in the Western Conference. The biggest trade between the two teams was the Oilers moving Raffi Torres to the Ohio team for Gilbert Brulé, which ended the Paul Coffey trade tree. Not only that, there haven’t been any memorable moments between the two teams.
So that begs the question, what is the topic of this week’s Throwback Thursday? Well, 41 years ago to the day, the Oilers acquired four-time Stanley Cup winner, Kevin McClelland from the Pittsburgh Penguins. Let’s look at his tenure in Edmonton, as well as the trade tree that came of it.
The initial trade with the Penguins
On Aug. 7, 1979, just a few months after the Oilers officially joined the National Hockey League, they traded Joe Micheletti to the St. Louis Blues for Tom Roulston and Risto Siltanen.
The latter played 206 games with the Oilers, scoring 38 goals and 151 points as a defenceman, not too shabby. He was traded to the Hartford Whalers for Ken Linseman, with the trade tree going nowhere.
Rolston played four seasons with the Oilers, scoring 36 goals and 68 points in 137 games, but was traded to the Pittsburgh Penguins on Dec. 5, 1983, for McClelland and a sixth-round pick which turned out to be Emanuel Viveiros.
Starting with Viveiros, the defenceman never played with the Oilers and was traded for Don Biggs (who never played for the Oilers), and Gord Sherven, who played five games in his second stint with the Oilers. However, Viveiros was the Assistant Coach of the Oilers in 2018-19 and currently serves as the Vancouver Giants head coach.
McClelland had already played two seasons in the National Hockey League before the trade, and once he arrived in Edmonton, he scored eight goals and 28 points in 52 games. In the postseason, he scored four goals and 10 points, helping the Oilers to their first Stanley Cup. In the first game of the Stanley Cup Final, he scored the only goal to give the Oilers a 1-0 series lead.
McClelland spent parts of six more seasons with the Oilers, scoring 48 goals and 122 points in 376 games played. On Nov. 2, 1989, he was traded alongside Jimmy Carson and a 1991 fifth-round pick (Brad Layzell) to the Detroit Red Wings for Adam Graves, Petr Klíma, Joe Murphy, and Jeff Sharples, kicking off a decade-long trade tree.
McClelland dealt to Detroit in multi-player trade
Adam Graves was the best player the Oilers acquired in this trade, scoring nine goals and 21 points in 63 games after his arrival. In 1990-91, he scored seven goals and 25 points in 76 games, with the Oilers allowing him to walk as a free agent after the season. Over his next 12 seasons (10 with the New York Rangers and two with the San Jose Sharks), Graves scored 306 goals and 556 points in 935 games, including a 52-goal season in 1993-94, the year the Rangers won the Stanley Cup.
Petr Klíma was solid for the Oilers in the four seasons he spent with the Oilers in his first stint. After the trade, he scored 25 goals and 53 points in 63 games, followed by a career-best 40-goal, 68-point season in 1990-91. In his final two seasons with the Oilers, he scored 53 goals and 82 points in 125 games but was traded to the Tampa Bay Lightning before the 1993 draft for a third-round pick that turned out to be Brad Symes, who never played a National Hockey League game.
Jeff Sharples never played another NHL game after the trade, but had a lengthy career in the American Hockey League and the International Hockey League, playing five seasons with the Utah Grizzlies, who we looked at briefly in last week’s Throwback Thursday article. The Oilers sent him to the New Jersey Devils before the 1990 trade deadline for Reijo Ruotsalainen.
This branch of the trade tree ends with Ruotsalainen, but the defenceman had two different stints with the Oilers, this being the second stint. In his first stint in 1986-87, he won a Stanley Cup. In his second stint in 1989-90, he won his second Stanley Cup, playing a grand total of 26 regular season games for the Oilers and 43 postseason games. Funnily enough, he serves as an assistant coach of the Flint Firebirds in the Ontario Hockey League, coaching Oiler prospects Nathaniel Day and Connor Clattenburg.
The last branch of the McClelland trade is what made the trade tree last into the new millennium, as the Oilers also acquired Joe Murphy from the Red Wings. Murphy spent three seasons with the Oilers, scoring 69 (nice) goals and 169 points in 222 games, before being shipped off to the Chicago Blackhawks on Feb. 24, 1993 for Igor Kravchuk and Dean McAmmond. We’ll split these two branches into two sections.
The Igor Kravchuk branch
The first part of the Joe Murphy trade saw the Oilers acquire Igor Kravchuk. He played parts of four seasons with the Oilers, scoring 27 goals and 88 points in 160 games. In early 1996, he was traded with Ken Sutton to the St. Louis Blues in exchange for Donald Dufresne and Jeff Norton. The former played 64 games with the Oilers, scoring a goal and eight points in his final two NHL seasons.
Norton also had a short stint with the Oilers, playing parts of two seasons with the team while scoring six goals and 33 points in 92 games. Just over 14 months later, the Oilers traded him to the Tampa Bay Lightning for Drew Bannister and a sixth-round pick in the 1997 draft that turned out to be Peter Sarno.
Both Bannister and Sarno were traded by the Oilers. Starting with the latter, Sarno played six games with the Oilers, scoring a goal and taking a penalty. Before the 2004 trade deadline, he was traded to the Vancouver Canucks for Tyler Moss, who never played a game with the Oilers.
Bannister played 35 games with the Oilers in two seasons, before the Oilers sent him to the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim for Bobby Dollas. Dollas played 30 games with the Oilers, scoring two goals and seven points, before the Oilers traded him along with Tony Hrkac to the Pittsburgh Penguins for the rights to Josef Beránek, his second stint with the Oilers.
Dollas was involved in another trade a few years later, once again being traded to the Penguins, this time from the Sharks who got Jeff Norton in return.
Beránek’s second stint with the Oilers saw him score 28 goals and 66 points in 124 games, before being traded back to the Penguins in exchange for German Titov. The Russian only played seven games with the Oilers, picking up four assists before departing in free agency, ending this trade branch of the trade tree.
The Dean McAmmond branch
The Dean McAmmond branch had the potential to be a massive trade tree for the Oilers, but they bungled it. McAmmond played parts of six seasons with the Oilers, scoring 61 goals and 161 points in 303 games, including a 19-goal and 50-point season in 1997-98. He was traded, along with Jonas Elofsson, Boris Mironov, and a second-round pick (Dmitri Levinsky) to the Chicago Blackhawks for Daniel Cleary, Chad Kilger, Christian Laflamme, Ethan Moreau, and a second-round pick (Alexei Semenov)
Starting with the dead-end branches: Ethan Moreau played parts of 11 seasons with the Oilers, scoring 112 goals and 212 points in 653 games while playing 40 postseason games with the team. In 2006, 21 of those games were played where he scored two goals and three points, but you can read about the Oilers’ Cinderella Run in a different Throwback Thursday. Before the 2007-08 season, he became the 12th captain in the Oilers’ NHL history but was waived before the 2010 season and claimed off waivers by the Columbus Blue Jackets. He won a cup with the Los Angeles Kings in 2012.
Daniel Cleary played four seasons with the Oilers, scoring 31 goals and 85 points in 220 games, with the Oilers buying out his contract after the 2002-03 season. After a stint with the Phoenix Coyotes in 2003-04, Cleary signed with the Detroit Red Wings before the 2005-06 season and broke out, winning a Stanley Cup with the team in 2008. In his 10 seasons with the Wings, he scored 124 goals and 275 points in 609 games, including a 26-goal season in 2010-11.
Chad Kilger played three seasons with the Oilers, scoring nine goals and 14 points in 87 games, before being traded to the Montréal Canadiens for Sergei Zholtok. The Russian’s career with the Oilers only lasted 37 games, where he scored four goals and 20 points before being traded for a 2002 seventh-round pick that turned out to be Jean-François Dufort. Dufort never played a professional game.
Laflamme played parts of two seasons with the Oilers, playing 61 games with six assists before he was traded alongside Matthieu Descoteaux to the Montréal Canadiens for Alain Nasreddine and Igor Ulanov. Nasreddine never played for the Oilers, while Ulanov had two stints with the Oilers, scoring three goals and 25 points in 81 games in his first stint. Neither player was traded.
The last branch of this trade saw the Oilers receive a second-round pick in the 1999 draft, using it to pick Alexei Semenov. Semenov played parts of three seasons with the Oilers, scoring four goals and 14 points in 103 games, before being traded to the Florida Panthers for a fifth-round pick that turned out to be Bryan Pitton.
The netminder never played in the National Hockey League but spent time in the Oilers farm system in the American Hockey League and the East Coast Hockey League. Pitton retired after the 2017-18 season. The Kevin McClelland trade tree ended with Pitton’s departure from the organization after the 2010-11 season.
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