The Vancouver Canucks and the Edmonton Oilers meet in a Pacific division NHL matchup from Rogers Place on Wednesday night.
The Vancouver Canucks will look to take another step forward in a frustrating 2021-22 season where the Canucks finished with a record of 40-30-12, 5 points out of a playoff spot. The bulk of the Canucks’ core is in tact still, led by J.T. Miller who had a team-high 99 points and shared the team lead with 32 goals with Elias Pettersson. Quinn Hughes returns on the blue line after logging 68 points with 60 assists last year while Brock Boeser, Bo Horvat and Conor Garland make up Vancouver’s top six scorers from last year all returning. Ilya Mikheyev is a nice addition to bring goal scoring to the third line and Curtis Lazar’s a solid 4th line forward while Andrei Kuzmenko is a big coup coming over from the KHL. Thatcher Demko returns between the pipes after going 33-22-7 with a 2.72 GAA and a .915 save percentage last season.
The Edmonton Oilers will look to take another step in the right direction after going 49-27-6 in 2021-22, finishing 2nd in the Pacific division. The Oilers took out the Kings in seven games in the first round before winning a five-game battle of Alberta series in the second round. That’s where it ended though as the Oilers were swiftly swept by the eventual Stanley cup champion Colorado Avalanche. The top tier of Edmonton’s roster returns with Connor McDavid back after logging 123 points for his 2nd straight Art Ross trophy and 4th in the last six years, also garnering Ted Lindsay award nomination and an all-NHL second team nomination. Leon Draisaitl’s also back after putting up 110 points and a team-high 55 goals. The big need that had to be addressed for Edmonton was in goal and it was with the addition of Jack Campbell who takes over for the shaky pairing of Mike Smith and Mikko Koskinen from last season.
Vancouver is 8-3 in their last 11 games against the Western Conference and 5-2 in their last 7 games against the Pacific division while the over is 8-2-2 in their last 12 games overall. Edmonton is 20-7 in their last 27 home games and 15-6 in their last 21 games following a win while the over is 5-1 in their last 6 Wednesday games.
I get the case to be made for either side in this game, but I’m still leaning towards the under here. All four meetings last season finished under the number and that was with far less than what the Oilers had between the pipes with the addition of Jack Campbell. Vancouver didn’t make earth-shattering moves, but the core isn’t bad to begin with and I think this is a 3-2 or 4-1 kind of game. Give me the under in this one.