As the back half of October approaches, the Edmonton Oilers are the darlings of the league early in the 2026-27 season. They keep scoring and they keep winning, and it isn't all 9-7 horse races either. The team is finding different ways to win and to the observer's eye it looks like they're putting together something virtually unheard of in these parts: a defensive system.
Of course players like Connor McDavid and Evan Bouchard have been a big part of the team's early success, but even though the stars log more minutes than most of their supporting players, they can't play all 60, and the winning streak that Edmonton finds itself on has as much to do with the bottom six forwards, bottom pairing defense, and goaltending, as it does with offensive production.
Depth that matters
Ryan Shea wasn't a household name when he signed his free agent contract this summer, but he has followed up a strong preseason with a similarly efficient first two weeks of the regular one. He's plus 4, logging the third most minutes of all Oilers skaters, and he's contributing points as well, with a goal and two assists through five games. Shea looks set to prove that his production in his final year as a Pittsburgh Penguin wasn't an outlier, and that's a strong positive for the Oilers.
Max Jones hasn't played a perfect season, as illustrated by his minus 4 plus/minus total, but a deeper look shows that the depth winger is contributing in the right way more often than the wrong one. All of the minus' tallies on Jones' record were scored two game series that included a 9-7 boondoggle of a victory against the Vancouver Canucks. In the games that followed, Jones has been a steady even, neither scoring, nor being scored against. And while that isn't quite enough to keep him indefinitely on the pro club, it means he isn't hurting the team during the ten minutes or so he's played each night. Additionally Jones has thrown ten hits and had 3 takeaways.
Devon Levi's seasonal stat line is still recovering from Game 2 of the regular season. 7 goals against and a .653 save percentage are an ugly outlier, and it'll take a number of better finishes to balance that out. But some initial jitters are understandable when a young player suits up for their first time for a new club, and not only did the team in front of him give him enough goal support that the touchdown against didn't matter, Levi has looked great ever since. His two other starts resulted in 0.950 and .0935 save percentages. Those types of numbers have been a rare occurrence for an Oilers netminder, and Levi is making a difference when he gets his opportunities.
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