The back-to-back defending Western Conference champions are sitting in the Pacific Division’s third playoff spot, and with a road trip that includes Vegas, Colorado, and Dallas, the room for error is near zero with 19 games to go in the regular season.
As a collective, the only thing consistent about the Edmonton Oilers in 2025-26 has been inconsistent play.
As a team sitting with 68 points in the Western Conference, their playoff fate is far from certain. With San Jose, Seattle, and Los Angeles in striking distance of overtaking them for third place in the Pacific Division, the need to get out of a season-long funk is a theme that continues to be stressed, yet the Oilers remain unable to emerge from it.
With only 19 games left in the regular season, the Oilers have yet to win more than three games in a row and have allowed four or more goals in four of their past five games, bringing their total to 31 games overall in which they’ve allowed that many. Among teams sitting in a playoff spot in the Western Conference, only the Anaheim Ducks have allowed more goals than the Oilers.
In this upcoming road trip for Edmonton, which begins on Sunday night, three of the four teams they face, Vegas, Colorado, and Dallas, are ahead of them in the NHL standings, and the Oilers haven’t defeated a team currently sitting in a playoff spot in the Pacific since their Jan 26. 7-4 win over Anaheim.
Compared to the 2023-24 and 2024-25 campaigns, those Oilers editions were able to overcome their struggles and look like contenders late. This year’s team has yet to do it, and time is not on their side to prove to the rest of the league that they can sort things out.
Avry Lewis-McDougall has more in his latest video column:
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