The <a href="http://oilersnation.com/combinations">Edmonton Oilers</a> have played a lot of hockey over the last few years.

In fact, since the start of the 2022-23 season — the last two full seasons and through Saturday night&#8217;s games — they&#8217;ve played 280 combined regular season and post-season games. That&#8217;s the third most in the entire league.
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That&#8217;s 25 more games than the league average over that time, and 37 more games than any team who hasn&#8217;t made the playoffs. If you take it back one season further to include the 2021-22 season and it&#8217;s playoffs, it&#8217;s 36 games over the league average and 53 more than non-playoff teams.
In 2021-22 and 2022-23, they played an extra month of hockey, while last year, it was two extra months of hockey. Quick math is four extra months of hockey, travel and an inability to recover over the last three years. It may not seem like much on paper, but this kind of stuff can add up.
The Oilers have found themselves in a position where one has to wonder if it&#8217;s catching up to them. There&#8217;s been long stretches this season where the team has struggled to play at the top of their game and that&#8217;s been the case more often than not. Now, with three games left in the regular season before another first-round matchup with the <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/10/throwback-thursday-oilers-kings-playoffs-1980s-1990s/">Los Angeles Kings</a>, the Oilers have a crowded infirmary.
Evander Kane. <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/13/how-edmonton-oilers-fill-mattias-ekholm-minutes-in-playoffs/">Mattias Ekholm</a>. Leon Draisaitl. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. Zach Hyman. Jake Walman. John Klingberg. Trent Frederic.
Kane has missed the entirety of the season after undergoing significant abdominal surgery last September. Ekholm&#8217;s injury is unknown, but he&#8217;s battled injury and illness all year and <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/12/edmonton-mattias-ekholm-could-be-done-for-season-serious-injury-recall-two-from-bakersfield/">a report Saturday</a> indicated his season could be over. Draisaitl&#8217;s is unknown, but missed four games in March, returned for eight periods, and left with another injury. Nugent-Hopkins is battling an illness. <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/12/four-points-connor-mcdavid-edmonton-oilers-playoff-berth-loses-mattias-ekholm-zach-hyman/">Hyman was innocuously hurt</a> last week against the Blues. Then there&#8217;s <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/10/connor-mcdavid-returns-depth-scoring-powers-edmonton-oilers-playoff-bert/">Connor McDavid</a>, who for the second straight year, has missed a notable amount of games, pacing to play his fewest regular season games since his rookie year when he broke his collarbone.
In short, these guys have played a lot of hockey.
While this is clearly an issue for the Oilers, it&#8217;s also the case for other teams who have played a lot of hockey over the last few seasons. Looking at the other teams who have played the most since the start of the 2022-23 season, the Florida Panthers, who lead with 289 games, are without Matthew Tkachuk and Sam Bennett due to injury, while <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/03/11/nhl-notebook-florida-panthers-acquire-seth-jones-aaron-ekblad-performance-enhancing-drug-suspension/">Aaron Ekblad</a> is currently serving a suspension for getting popped for using performance enhancing drugs.
The Dallas Stars, second with 282 games, have been without Tyler Seguin since December due to hip surgery and Miro Hesikanan since the February with a knee injury. The Vegas Golden Knights, fourth with 273 games, are without Jack Eichel and Alex Pietrangelo.
Edmonton&#8217;s undoubtedly been hit harder than these clubs. Is it bad luck? That likely plays into it. Were some of these players rushed back a little early? It&#8217;s possible, but there&#8217;s another clear identifier that&#8217;s an issue for the team: they&#8217;re getting older, and doing so fast.
The average age of their forwards and defencemen is 29.7 years old, increasing by 2.3 years since the start of the 2021-22 season, according to <a href="http://hockeyviz.com">HockeyViz</a>. Their forward group has risen 3.9 years in average age, while their blue line just 0.7 years old.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-173230" src="http://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/image-58.jpg" alt="" width="726" height="306" srcset="https://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/image-58.jpg 726w, https://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/image-58-300x126.jpg 300w" sizes="(max-width: 726px) 100vw, 726px" />
The Oilers have embraced the greybeards, to pull a line from Ken Holland, and now the organization has been left scrambling. They chose not to match offer sheets for 22-year-olds Dylan Holloway or Philip Broberg last summer, moves that — at least in the case of Holloway — they likely regret, contrary to GM Stan Bowman&#8217;s recent comments.
And with Holland&#8217;s poor drafting and developing of prospect, Bowman and the new look front office has been forced to pivot this spring to the European and college free agent ranks to add some youth and others who could make the team soon, to the organization, signing forwards <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/02/oilers-sign-german-forward-josh-samanski-entry-level-contract/">Josh Samanski</a>, 23, <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/02/edmonton-oilers-sign-david-tomasek-one-year-contract/">David Tomasek</a>, 29, <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/13/what-edmonton-oilers-signing-quinn-hutson-bring-to-the-team/">Quinn Hutson</a>, 23, and defenceman <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/03/31/edmonton-oilers-sign-defenceman-damien-carfagna-to-two-year-entry-level-contract/">Damian Carfagna</a>, 22. They&#8217;re working to get one of their Russian prospects, <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/12/edmonton-oilers-working-sign-maxim-beryozkin/">Maxim Beryozkin</a>, 23, signed, while inking other draftees in goaltenders <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/05/edmonton-oilers-sign-nathaniel-day-to-three-year-entry-level-contract/">Nathaniel Day</a> and <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/12/edmonton-oilers-sign-goaltender-samuel-jonsson/">Samuel Jonsson</a> to entry-level deals.
Last year&#8217;s draft class appears to be trending in a promising direction, with first round pick Sam O&#8217;Reilly looking like a great choice and later round picks in Connor Clattenburg, Dalyn Wakely and William Nicholl — all forwards — <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/01/29/mid-season-oilers-prospect-report-looking-at-players-ranked-no-10-to-no-1/">outplaying their draft position</a>.
That&#8217;s good news for the team in the long run, but in the short-term, the hope is that the aforementioned players in the infirmary can get healthy and find a way to make an impact in the playoffs.
Otherwise it&#8217;s going to be a summer of early tee times for the Edmonton Oilers.
<hr />
Zach Laing is Oilersnation’s associate editor, senior columnist, and The Nation Network’s news director. He also makes up one-half of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QX_QCiZyIo&amp;list=PLRSWOpthKmdtmFOKQDd7TQdTU2KSKXYvX">DFO DFS Report</a>. He can be followed on Twitter, currently known as X, at <a href="http://www.x.com/zjlaing">@zjlaing</a>, or reached by email at zach.laing@bettercollective.com.
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The <a href="http://oilersnation.com/combinations">Edmonton Oilers</a> have played a lot of hockey over the last few years.



In fact, since the start of the 2022-23 season — the last two full seasons and through Saturday night's games — they've played 280 combined regular season and post-season games. That's the third most in the entire league.
<div class="bam-inline-promotion-block" data-max-length="2" data-placement-id="2107" data-context="web-content-promocard" data-property-id="325"></div>
That's 25 more games than the league average over that time, and 37 more games than any team who hasn't made the playoffs. If you take it back one season further to include the 2021-22 season and it's playoffs, it's 36 games over the league average and 53 more than non-playoff teams.

In 2021-22 and 2022-23, they played an extra month of hockey, while last year, it was two extra months of hockey. Quick math is four extra months of hockey, travel and an inability to recover over the last three years. It may not seem like much on paper, but this kind of stuff can add up.

The Oilers have found themselves in a position where one has to wonder if it's catching up to them. There's been long stretches this season where the team has struggled to play at the top of their game and that's been the case more often than not. Now, with three games left in the regular season before another first-round matchup with the <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/10/throwback-thursday-oilers-kings-playoffs-1980s-1990s/">Los Angeles Kings</a>, the Oilers have a crowded infirmary.

Evander Kane. <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/13/how-edmonton-oilers-fill-mattias-ekholm-minutes-in-playoffs/">Mattias Ekholm</a>. Leon Draisaitl. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. Zach Hyman. Jake Walman. John Klingberg. Trent Frederic.

Kane has missed the entirety of the season after undergoing significant abdominal surgery last September. Ekholm's injury is unknown, but he's battled injury and illness all year and <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/12/edmonton-mattias-ekholm-could-be-done-for-season-serious-injury-recall-two-from-bakersfield/">a report Saturday</a> indicated his season could be over. Draisaitl's is unknown, but missed four games in March, returned for eight periods, and left with another injury. Nugent-Hopkins is battling an illness. <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/12/four-points-connor-mcdavid-edmonton-oilers-playoff-berth-loses-mattias-ekholm-zach-hyman/">Hyman was innocuously hurt</a> last week against the Blues. Then there's <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/10/connor-mcdavid-returns-depth-scoring-powers-edmonton-oilers-playoff-bert/">Connor McDavid</a>, who for the second straight year, has missed a notable amount of games, pacing to play his fewest regular season games since his rookie year when he broke his collarbone.

In short, these guys have played a lot of hockey.

While this is clearly an issue for the Oilers, it's also the case for other teams who have played a lot of hockey over the last few seasons. Looking at the other teams who have played the most since the start of the 2022-23 season, the Florida Panthers, who lead with 289 games, are without Matthew Tkachuk and Sam Bennett due to injury, while <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/03/11/nhl-notebook-florida-panthers-acquire-seth-jones-aaron-ekblad-performance-enhancing-drug-suspension/">Aaron Ekblad</a> is currently serving a suspension for getting popped for using performance enhancing drugs.

The Dallas Stars, second with 282 games, have been without Tyler Seguin since December due to hip surgery and Miro Hesikanan since the February with a knee injury. The Vegas Golden Knights, fourth with 273 games, are without Jack Eichel and Alex Pietrangelo.

Edmonton's undoubtedly been hit harder than these clubs. Is it bad luck? That likely plays into it. Were some of these players rushed back a little early? It's possible, but there's another clear identifier that's an issue for the team: they're getting older, and doing so fast.

The average age of their forwards and defencemen is 29.7 years old, increasing by 2.3 years since the start of the 2021-22 season, according to <a href="http://hockeyviz.com">HockeyViz</a>. Their forward group has risen 3.9 years in average age, while their blue line just 0.7 years old.

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-173230" src="http://publish.oilersnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/image-58.jpg" alt="" width="726" height="306" />

The Oilers have embraced the greybeards, to pull a line from Ken Holland, and now the organization has been left scrambling. They chose not to match offer sheets for 22-year-olds Dylan Holloway or Philip Broberg last summer, moves that — at least in the case of Holloway — they likely regret, contrary to GM Stan Bowman's recent comments.

And with Holland's poor drafting and developing of prospect, Bowman and the new look front office has been forced to pivot this spring to the European and college free agent ranks to add some youth and others who could make the team soon, to the organization, signing forwards <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/02/oilers-sign-german-forward-josh-samanski-entry-level-contract/">Josh Samanski</a>, 23, <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/02/edmonton-oilers-sign-david-tomasek-one-year-contract/">David Tomasek</a>, 29, <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/13/what-edmonton-oilers-signing-quinn-hutson-bring-to-the-team/">Quinn Hutson</a>, 23, and defenceman <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/03/31/edmonton-oilers-sign-defenceman-damien-carfagna-to-two-year-entry-level-contract/">Damian Carfagna</a>, 22. They're working to get one of their Russian prospects, <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/12/edmonton-oilers-working-sign-maxim-beryozkin/">Maxim Beryozkin</a>, 23, signed, while inking other draftees in goaltenders <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/05/edmonton-oilers-sign-nathaniel-day-to-three-year-entry-level-contract/">Nathaniel Day</a> and <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/04/12/edmonton-oilers-sign-goaltender-samuel-jonsson/">Samuel Jonsson</a> to entry-level deals.

Last year's draft class appears to be trending in a promising direction, with first round pick Sam O'Reilly looking like a great choice and later round picks in Connor Clattenburg, Dalyn Wakely and William Nicholl — all forwards — <a href="https://oilersnation.com/2025/01/29/mid-season-oilers-prospect-report-looking-at-players-ranked-no-10-to-no-1/">outplaying their draft position</a>.

That's good news for the team in the long run, but in the short-term, the hope is that the aforementioned players in the infirmary can get healthy and find a way to make an impact in the playoffs.

Otherwise it's going to be a summer of early tee times for the Edmonton Oilers.

<hr />

Zach Laing is Oilersnation’s associate editor, senior columnist, and The Nation Network’s news director. He also makes up one-half of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QX_QCiZyIo&amp;list=PLRSWOpthKmdtmFOKQDd7TQdTU2KSKXYvX">DFO DFS Report</a>. He can be followed on Twitter, currently known as X, at <a href="http://www.x.com/zjlaing">@zjlaing</a>, or reached by email at zach.laing@bettercollective.com.

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Oilersnation fans! Gear up for the best sleep of your life with Douglas - recently named Canada’s Best Mattress. Made specifically for Canadians, the Douglas mattress features three layers of high-quality foam giving you the cool, comfortable sleep you deserve. Get a FREE Sleep Bundle with your mattress including 2 memory foam pillows, a luxurious set of sheets, and more! Visit <a href="https://www.douglas.ca/nation/">Douglas.ca/Nation</a> or check out their Manchester Square location in Edmonton.

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