Oilers Game Notes 5.0: Nashville hosts Edmonton seeking first win

After edging out the Philadelphia Flyers in overtime for their first win of the 2024-25 season, the Edmonton Oilers will travel to Music City to face the winless Nashville Predators.

1. The Preds have been stuck in the middle of the Western Conference for the past few years and made a handful of significant additions over the summer to try to elevate themselves back into Stanley Cup contention.

They signed long-time Tampa Bay Lightning captain Steven Stamkos, former Conn Smythe winner Jonathan Marchessault, and skilled defender Brady Skjei in free agency, and they locked up goaltender Juuse Saros to an eight-year contract extension. They also traded shutdown defender Ryan McDonagh back to the Lightning in a salary cap-clearing move and dealt Cody Glass and Yaroslav Askarov in change-of-scenery deals.

This new-look Nashville team has come slowly out of the gate as the Preds own a 0-3-0 record through their first week of play. They opened their season with a 4-3 loss at home to the Dallas Stars, they were shut out 3-0 on the road by the Detroit Red Wings, and they were hammered 7-3 at home by the Seattle Kraken.

2. The Oilers also made a handful of changes over the off-season and aren’t off to the start that many expected. The team lost Warren Foegele and Vincent Desharnais in free agency, Ryan McLeod and Cody Ceci were traded as salary cap casualties, and Philip Broberg and Dylan Holloway signed offer sheets. Viktor Arvidsson, Jeff Skinner, Vasily Podkolzin, and Ty Emberson, among others, were added in their spots. With Evander Kane also on the LTIR following surgery, the Oilers are a very different team in October than in the spring.

Edmonton dropped their first game of the season 6-0 to the Winnipeg Jets and lost back-to-back games to the Chicago Blackhawks and Calgary Flames over the weekend. They finally earned their first win on Tuesday with a come-from-behind overtime win over the Flyers to finish their season-opening homestand with a 1-3-0 record.

3. The Oilers played in pre-season mode during their losses to the Jets, Hawks, and Flames but finally showed some urgency against the Flyers. The team has a few issues to sort out in the early stages of this season and won’t be able to cruise through their opponents with the low effort they displayed over those first three losses.

They have some strong underlying numbers at even-strength, highlighted by a league-leading 254-to-155 shot attempt differential, but their special teams units have weighed them down over the first few games of the season. Edmonton’s usually-dominant power play has scored one goal on nine opportunities and their penalty kill has been torn apart with seven goals against on 16 opportunities.

The same players who have been successful in power play for years are still here, and there’s no reason to assume that this scoring slump will continue. That isn’t the same case with the penalty kill, though. Ceci and Desharnais were first and third in minutes per game on Edmonton’s kill last season, and the team no longer has the speed of McLeod or Foegele on the PK up front.

4. Music City has been one of Edmonton’s favourite travel destinations over the past few seasons. Since the 2018-19 season, the Oilers have gone 11-2-2 in their head-to-head with the Predators, including a 5-0-2 record in Nashville.

Leon Draisaitl has become known as The Mayor of Nashville for his ridiculous numbers against the Preds. Over those 15 games that the team went 11-2-2, Draisaitl scored 23 goals and 37 points.