This past week has seen plenty of activity in the NHL with multiple blockbuster deals taking the league by storm. The Edmonton Oilers have been noticeably absent from the excitement, aside from them re-signing their trade deadline acquisitions, Jason Dickinson and Connor Murphy.
As things stand right now, the team has multiple pending unrestricted free agents who are set to hit the open market on July 1st. One of which being their starting goalie, Connor Ingram who seems poised to leave the Oilers.
Through all of this, another big iron in the fire is longtime Oilers defenceman and former top 10 NHL Draft pick by the club, Darnell Nurse. He submitted his trade request earlier this month and gave the Oilers a number of teams he would accept a deal to, reportedly: The Pittsburgh Penguins, Los Angeles Kings, and Philadelphia Flyers.
There has been plenty of speculation surrounding the Flyers as options for Nurse, who would covet his size and physical presence as well as the combination of his puck moving game.
According to NHL insider David Pagnotta of the Fourth Period, there are other teams in addition to those three that have interest in Nurse. The Boston Bruins are one and the Anaheim Ducks are said to have serious interest.
More on Nurse: As we know, Pittsburgh, LA and Philly are in his trade list. You can add Boston to his list, as well. https://t.co/D3Gf9pQ5aW
— David Pagnotta (@TheFourthPeriod) June 26, 2026
Ducks express serious interest in Nurse
As Pagnotta reports, the Bruins are another team that is in the Nurse conversation with the Ducks having expressed 'serious' interest. This puts the number of reported teams at five with the lucky news being that none have gone out and added a top four defender with the Ducks even shedding Olen Zellweger on Friday.
As of right now, they have only Jackson LaCombe, Drew Helleson, and Ian Moore under contract next season with a restricted free agent in Pavel Mintyukov who if he re-signs would make just four defencemen.
There are multiple defencemen expected to leave their ranks in free agency like John Carlson who may be one of the top players on the open market. There is also veteran bruiser, Radko Gudas who will be testing the market as well.
Nurse could add some much needed veteran leadership and tons of experience playing with elite players as well as making deep runs into the Stanley Cup Finals. His experience would be valuable and given their $44 million in projected cap space for next season, they have more than enough to potentially absorb Nurse's $9.25 million cap hit. They are also a team with a fairly robust prospect pool and a boatload of picks in the next few drafts.
They would do well to pay what should be a relatively low upfront cost for Nurse, especially compared to the market price for a defensive upgrade, like the Bowen Byram trade.
There does not seem to be anything immediately imminent but there does seem to be some real pressure to get things sorted as soon as possible. If not, there is always the possibility that teams who are unable to secure a tangible upgrade in free agency, go for Nurse as a sort of 'secondary' market. This would also come after a large $6 million signing bonus is paid to Nurse.
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