Bouchard is Oilers’ Best Offensive
Defenceman Since Coffey
January 11,
2024 by Brian Swane
Evan Bouchard is playing the best hockey of his young NHL
career for the Edmonton Oilers. The 24-year-old defenceman has honed his
offensive game and made great strides defensively over the last several weeks
since the Oilers hired Hall-of-Famer Paul Coffey as an assistant coach who
works most closely with the team’s rearguards.
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So it’s perhaps not coincidental that Bouchard is now on
course to have the greatest statistical season by an Edmonton defenceman since
Coffey was leading rushes from the Oilers backend.
Through the first 37 games of Edmonton’s 2023-24 schedule,
Bouchard has scored nine goals and assisted on 30 others to tie for third among
all NHL defencemen with a total of 39 points. Meanwhile, his three game-winning
goals (GWG) are the most by any blueliner in the NHL this season.
Bouchard
Piles Up Points
Oil Country hasn’t seen numbers like this from a defenceman
in decades. The last Oilers blueliner to reach 30 assists this early in the
season was Coffey in 1986-87, and if Bouchard only picks up one point in the
next nine games, he will still get to 40 points in a season quicker than any
Oilers defenceman since Coffey in 1986-87.
If he plays every game and continues producing his current
rate of 1.05 points per game, Bouchard will total 86 points this season. That
would be the sixth most points in a season ever by an Oilers defenceman,
trailing only Coffey’s five consecutive seasons of at least 89 points from
1981-82 to 1985-86.
Bouchard is already tied for the sixth most game-winning
goals by an Oilers defenceman in one season and has a very good chance to join
Coffey, Charlie Huddy and Sheldon Souray as the only defencemen in franchise
history to score 20 goals in a season. He needs just 20 helpers in Edmonton’s
remaining 45 games for a 50-assist campaign, something that no Oilers
defenceman other than Coffey has achieved.
Bouchard
Playing Better Defensively
The Oilers started the season 2-9-1, but have won 19 of their
last 25 games and are currently on an eight-game winning streak. Edmonton is
18-6-0 since Nov. 12 when head coach Jay Woodcroft and assistant coach Dave
Manson were fired and replaced with Kris Knoblauch and Coffey, respectively.
Defensive play has factored significantly in the Oilers’ turnaround, as they
have a goals-against average (GAA) of 2.83 since the coaching changes, compared
to a GAA of 3.92 before.
Bouchard’s personal improvements mirror the strides made by
the team as a whole: he’s cut down on mistakes, is making smarter reads, and
getting caught out of position far less often. After starting the season with a
rating of minus-8 through the Oilers’ first six games of the season, he’s now
climbed into the positive territory, thanks to a rating of plus-10 over
Edmonton’s current win streak.
Bouchard
Deserves All-Star Consideration
The NHL All-Star Fan Vote closes tonight (Jan. 11) at
11:59:59 pm EST. The top eight skaters in voting will have their tickets
punched to All-Star Weekend in Toronto Feb. 1-3.
Bouchard, who has a strong case to share the ice with the
league’s brightest stars at Scotiabank Arena next month, ranked 15th among
skaters in the initial voting returns released on Tuesday (Jan. 9). With
174,414 votes, the Oilers’ blueliner trailed eighth place by 187,796.
Coffey represented the Oilers at five straight NHL All-Star
Games, from 1982 to 1986. Just one Edmonton defenceman has been selected to the
All-Star Game over the last 20 years, Sheldon Souray in 2009. Bouchard has one
last chance to make an impression on voters when the Oilers take on the Detroit
Red Wings at Little Caesar’s Arena tonight.