Is anyone else as excited as I am that Ryan Nugent-Hopkins is coming back? Today, the Oilers announced that Nuge has been taken off the IR and is set to make his return tomorrow night against the Coyotes.

After spending nearly two months on the shelf, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins will be back in the lineup against the Arizona Coyotes on Saturday night and I could not be more excited. For the first time all season, the Oilers will have three offensive centres available to create havoc against the opposition. At the trade deadline, Chiarelli noted that he did want to see what his team would look like with three offensive lines. Tomorrow night will be the first time that we all get to see what that would look like. 

From where I blog, I’m excited to see what Nuge will look like with Draisaitl and McDavid. Having three offensive centremen available to mix and match throughout the lines will give McLellan plenty of options for picking apart the opposing defense. Regardless of which line plays/produces most (McDavid/Drai/Nuge) on any given night (it will change), having these three options will cause mayhem for other coaches. Want to shut down McDavid’s line? Here comes Drai or Nuge. Imagine the possibilities! Not to mention, you’d have to think that replacing Mark Letestu with Nuge will also help a power play that has been shockingly awful. 

At the end of the day, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins remains the Oilers’ best two way forward and their most experienced offensive centre, despite having a down year. Nuge has the ability to be a game changer, but he also has the skill set that allows him to play responsible defensive minutes even when he’s not producing as much as he’d like. I do think that will change, though. I’d bet that having Nuge back in the lineup will take some of the tough minutes away from McDavid and Draisaitl, freeing all three of them up to play against more favourable matchups.

In the very least, it will be fun to see other teams trying to figure how to handle the Oilers defensively. Rather than focusing on one or two lines that can produce, they’ll have to think about three. This is a beautiful problem to have. Other teams would kill for the kind of depth at centre that the Oilers are boasting, and I’m ready to predict that having all of them in the lineup will help the three players flourish. Things are about to get interesting around here.