Last season, the Edmonton Oilers had six different players reach the 20-goal milestone. That was actually tied for the second-most in the league with both the Colorado Avalanche and the Utah Mammoth. 

The only team to have more was the Carolina Hurricanes, who had seven different players hit the milestone. What’s surprising about the Canes is that even though they were the second-highest-scoring team in the league, their highest scorer was Seth Jarvis with 32 goals. 

They really didn’t have an elite goal-scorer, but they really did produce offence by committee.

Edmonton finished sixth in goals last season, but if you take special teams out of it and look at just even-strength scoring, they fall to 11th in the league.

The leaders for the Oilers were the usual suspects. Connor McDavid led the way with 48 goals, Leon Draisaitl picked up 35 in just 65 games, and Zach Hyman popped home 31 goals in just 58 games, which prorates to roughly 44 goals over the course of an 82-game season.

The other players to hit the 20-goal mark were Jack Roslovic (21), Evan Bouchard (21), and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (20).

The Oilers’ forward group for this upcoming season is largely unchanged. Jack Roslovic is out after signing a two-year deal with the Toronto Maple Leafs, and while that does mean that they lost a 20 goal scorer, that also means that there is some extra top-six playing time to go around, and that could push one of the players who got close to 20 goals last season to hit the milestone in 2026-27.

Could they actually pass the number they hit last season? Let’s take a look.

THE LOCKS

There are no surprises in this category. McDavid has scored at least 20 goals in every season since his rookie campaign, when he still managed to score 16 goals despite missing almost half the season with a shoulder injury.

The only other season where he was below 30 goals was 2024-25, when he scored 26 goals in 67 games.

Assuming he’s fully healthy, McDavid should be good for 35-plus again this season.

Draisaitl is on a nice run of 10 straight seasons with 20 or more goals, with the........

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