At the time of this writing, hours before puck drop for the May 6 game between the Edmonton Oilers and the Vancouver Canucks, Connor McDavid is currently doing his thing leading the league with 93 points in 51 games. He’s currently piling on 1.82 PPG. Projected out to a whole season he’s currently looking at 102 points.
So, he’s on track. But this would mean that he’d have to put up 7 points in 5 games, with at least 2 of those games being multi-point games. That’s certainly doable, especially for him. McDavid himself is currently downplaying the significance of the 100 point marker this season, but Leon Draisaitl has publicly said the team isn’t. They’re feeding him the puck even more than normal hoping he’ll create something and put up a point. They want him to get there, even if he doesn’t care.
Can Connor McDavid do it?
It’s a tough order, but if anyone can do it Connor can. Helping him out immensely is the fact that 3 of the remaining 5 games in the season are against the basement-dwelling Vancouver Canucks.
The X Factor of the Edmonton Oilers
The 1 wildcard in this quest that might slow him down is the fact that the 2 non-Canucks games are against the Montreal Canadiens, a team that by and large has trouble scoring goals from guys not named Tyler Toffoli, but are veritable all-stars defensively. They’ve done the best job out of any team in the Scotia North division at shutting him down.
That being said, he got that monkey off his back in games against the Habs in the latter half of the season. But they’ve had time to study videos of him during those games. Will they step up their defensive game even more or will Connor simply find a way to overcome them as he has every other team in the division? Only time will tell with that question.
Even with McDavid, you can’t expect offence out of him literally every single game. Even if he’s shut out in those 2 games against the Habs, which IMO is unlikely, it’s a safe bet that he’d make up for that in those games against the Canucks.
Even Sportsnet when broadcasting the games has started a “Connor Countdown” counter where they add in real-time to his point totals during the game. You can bet they break it out again in the game tonight, look for it. Fun fact – you know what the real crazy thing about this whole situation is? In a full 82 game season, McDavid would finish with 149 points if his projections hold up. That’s insane.
So will Connor McDavid do it?
I think he will. He’s too good not to. Nothing is over until the final buzzer sounds on game 56, but I think he will. And now, to end the blog, why not check out some Connor McDavid highlights?
Pumped me up. 😀