The primary three weeks of the 2026-27 NHL season have been the Connor McDavid present.
He’s placing the Edmonton Oilers on his again and carrying it in a method that’s nearly arduous to imagine. He has all the time been the principle piece driving them, however it’s by no means been fairly to the diploma now we have seen within the early a part of this season.
He continued that on Thursday with one more five-point recreation of their 6-5 shootout win over the defending Stanley Cup champion Carolina Hurricanes.
That five-point recreation put him onto a uncommon checklist, and continued to construct his completely bonkers numbers to begin the season.
Connor McDavid joins uncommon membership with one other five-point recreation
Thursday’s recreation was already McDavid’s third five-point recreation of the season, making him simply the second participant in NHL historical past to ever have a minimum of three five-point video games throughout the first 10 video games of his group’s season.
Pittsburgh Penguins Corridor of Famer Mario Lemieux is the one different participant on that checklist.
He did it two totally different instances.
Thursday’s effort offers him 31 factors for the season in simply 10 video games, which might be a 260-point tempo over the 84-game season.
The NHL file for probably the most factors in a single season is 215 factors, set by Wayne Gretzky in the course of the 1985-86 season when he was additionally a member of the Oilers.
Including to the jaw-dropping nature of his early level manufacturing is the actual fact he’s, as of Thursday evening, 12 factors forward of each different participant within the NHL this season.
Jack Eichel (Vegas Golden Knights) is the league’s second-leading scorer with 19 factors, whereas he has performed two further video games than McDavid.
However that is not all.
Together with Thursday’s win, the Oilers have scored 46 targets this season.
McDavid has been on the ice for 37 of them (80% of their targets), which implies they’ve managed to attain solely 9 targets in 10 video games with out him on the ice.
He has factored into the scoring (both scoring the aim or setting it up) on 31 of them (67.3%).
All of those numbers are absurd and virtually extraordinary within the NHL.
Whereas that is spectacular because it pertains to McDavid, it does depart some massive questions for the way good the Oilers supporting forged is. That is merely not sufficient offense from the remainder of the group, whereas they’re being outscored at a regarding stage when he’s sitting on the bench.
It’s working so long as McDavid is enjoying at a record-setting tempo. However in some unspecified time in the future, he isn’t going to be averaging over three factors per recreation. Sooner or later, he’ll hit a chilly spell. It occurs to everyone over the course of a protracted season. The check for the way good this Oilers group is can be what occurs when McDavid hits a type of chilly spells and whether or not or not they’ve sufficient assist round him to make up for it.
This has been the Oilers’ largest downside all through McDavid’s total profession, and it’s simply one of many flaws which have prevented them from profitable a Stanley Cup with him. Even with the 8-1-1 file after Thursday’s win, these issues are nonetheless lurking below the floor. McDavid is simply hiding them.
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