October 24, 2024 by Ryan Lotsberg

Edmonton Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch is continuing to experiment with his defence pairings in the early stages of this young season. The problem is the clear hole on the right side of the second pairing beside Darnell Nurse. There are a lot of questions, but no answers on the right side right now.

The latest experiment occurred in Tuesday’s loss to the Carolina Hurricanes where Nurse played on the right side with Travis Dermott. Nurse had minimal experience playing on the right side in the NHL prior to Tuesday’s game. Nurse talked about how playing the right side isn’t that big of a deal prior to Tuesday’s game. There are a lot of moments where defencemen switch sides during the course of a game, so it’s not foreign to him.

Well, the numbers from Natural Stat Trick weren’t pretty. Nurse had a rough game from an analytical perspective.

The reality is that it is different playing your off side versus your strong side. You get the puck in different spots, and you often have to pivot in the opposite direction that you’re used to pivoting. Your passing angles change as well because your stick is closer to the boards on your strong side, whereas your stick is closer to the middle of the ice on your off side. 

I don’t think it would be a significant change for an elite professional hockey player, but a learning curve should be expected. Nurse is a fantastic skater, and he should be able to figure it out. The first game didn’t go well, but it would be an interesting experiment to continue.

The Oilers’ desire to upgrade their defence via trade this season is probably the worst kept secret in hockey. The market for right-handed defencemen that would be upgrades, that are on teams that are unlikely to make the playoffs, and that could be available at the trade deadline is pretty slim.

Jeff Petry (M-NTC), Cody Ceci, Henry Jokiharju, and Will Borgen are the only impending UFAs that fit the criteria. Dante Fabbro could find himself in that group as well. Your mileage on the legitimacy of these names as second pairing options and fits with Nurse may vary.

Ideally, the acquired player would have some term beyond this season. Rasmus Andersson (M-NTC), Connor Murphy (M-NTC), Nick Jensen, Radko Gudas (M-NTC), Justin Holl (M-NTC), and Connor Clifton all have one year left after this season. Jared Spurgeon (M-NTC), Rasmus Ristolainen, Artem Zub (M-NTC), and John Marino (M-NTC) all have two years left after this one. 

The market opens up by a substantial margin if Nurse can play the right side and the Oilers can target a left-handed defenceman. Ivan Provorov, Jacob Chychrun (M-NTC), Marcus Pettersson (M-NTC), Alec Martinez, Brian Dumoulin (M-NTC), Olli Maata, and Matt Grzelyck are all left-handed impending UFAs that could be available at the trade deadline. 

Cam Fowler (M-NTC), Mike Matheson (M-NTC), Ben Chiarot (M-NTC), Jamie Oleksiak (M-NTC), TJ Brodie, Jake Walman, and Mario Ferraro all have one year left after this one.

The left-handed options are far more confidence inspiring than the right-handed ones.

Those options only become possibilities if Nurse or Mattias Ekholm can play the right side, unless they find a left-handed option that has experience on the right side. A better version of Dermott, if you will.

If this experiment with Nurse on the right side pans out, then it just gives the Oilers more flexibility at the trade deadline. I would personally try Brett Kulak alongside Nurse. Kulak can play the right side, but he prefers the left side. If Nurse can play the right side, perhaps it makes sense to see if Kulak and Nurse can handle the second pairing duties together.

I still think that splitting up Ekholm and Evan Bouchard is worth a chance as well. Bouchard has all the qualities of an ideal partner for Nurse. I feel that worries about their defensive zone play are over exaggerated. They would have the puck far more often than the opponents would.

Ekholm is also a better choice for a player to insulate weaker defencemen than Nurse is. Some people think that Nurse should be able to carry a successful second pairing regardless of who his partner is because of his contract, but I would argue that a player making his money should be playing on the top pairing.

There’s a lot of track left before the trade deadline. There’s lots of time left for Knoblauch to experiment with the defence pairings. Playing Nurse on the right side is a creative idea that certainly merits exploration, and there are other options that merit exploration too.

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