Mike Babcock's Edmonton Oilers giving off that Stanley Cup vibe in two critical areas

It’s early days for the Edmonton Oilers under Mike Babcock, and it would be easy for recency bias to inflate the hopes of Oilers fans and pundits. After all, Edmonton just had a brilliant defensive game against San Jose, limiting that young and high-powered team to just seven Grade A shots against and one five-alarm against shots in Saturday’s 3-1 win.

By comparison, last season the Oilers gave up on average 13.6 Grade A shots against and 6.8 five-alarm shots against per game last year.

In total, after five games this year, the Oilers have given up 10.4 Grade A shots against and 5.8 five-alarm shots against per game this year under Babcock.

Edmonton’s defensive numbers are much more aligned with what the team did in 2024-25 and 2023-24, when the team when on deep Stanley Cup playoff runs, alll the way to the Final.

In those two seasons, Edmonton gave up just 11.6 and 12.0 Grade A respectively, and 6.1 and 5.8 five-alarm shots respectively.

In this way, Edmonton’s mediocre 2025-26 season is the anomaly. The teams still attacked with great success last year, but its defensive play was mediocre and its goaltending also took a step back.

Edmonton’s defencemen, led by Evan Bouchard have picked up their play the most compared to last season.

Bouchard has been playing at an MVP-level so far this year. In even strength play, the Oilers have scored 14 goals and given up just one goal against with Bouchard on the ice. When he’s not been on the ice, Edmonton has scored five goals and given up 10.

Indeed, the first unit players — Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Vasily Podkolzin, Bouchard and Mattias Ekholm — are driving the success of the Oilers right, validating Babcock’s decision to put them all together. Other players who are getting the job done so far at seven strength include Trent Frederic, Jason Dickinson, Mathieu Joseph, Ryan Shea and Ty Emberson.