3 Takeaways From the Oilers’ First Training Camp Line Combinations

The Edmonton Oilers finally got on the ice Thursday, which means the annual exercise of trying to read the future from a few lines of players has officially begun. It is only training camp. Lines will change. Players will move around. Somebody will probably be skating beside Connor McDavid on Saturday who wasn't even close to that spot on Thursday.

Still, the first combinations under new head coach Mike Babcock are worth looking at. Three things caught my attention.

Takeaway 1: McDavid and Draisaitl are still together.

That was probably the easiest thing to notice. Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl were together again, but Zach Hyman wasn't on their wing. Instead, Vasily Podkolzin got the first opportunity. That's interesting because Babcock could have decided immediately that the Oilers needed to shake everything up. He didn't.

Maybe that's a pretty good reminder that sometimes a new coach doesn't need to fix what isn't broken. McDavid and Draisaitl know how to play together. Everybody knows how dangerous they can be together. The question may simply be who fits best around them.

Takeaway 2. Isaac Howard gets an interesting opportunity.

The other combination I kept coming back to was Ryan Nugent-Hopkins between Howard and Hyman. That's a pretty nice place for a young player to start camp.

Howard gets an experienced centre who knows how to play with elite talent, plus a winger who's spent years finding ways to get into scoring areas. There is some responsibility there, but there is also a lot of opportunity. And it gives Edmonton another potentially dangerous line instead of putting everything on McDavid and Draisaitl. That could become important over an 82-game season.

Takeaway 3. The blue line could be just as interesting.

Evan Bouchard started beside newcomer Ryan Shea, while Jake Walman was with Connor Murphy and Mattias Ekholm was paired with Shakir Mukhamadullin. Nobody should read too much into those combinations yet. But Ekholm working with Mukhamadullin caught my eye.

Having an experienced defenceman beside a young player is useful. If that pairing sticks, Ekholm could give Mukhamadullin a little room to learn while Babcock figures out exactly what he has. And that's really what training camp is supposed to do.

Babcock knows some things. He needs to learn others.

The Oilers aren't trying to find out whether McDavid and Draisaitl can play hockey. They know that. They're trying to figure out what everything around them should look like.

Thursday gave us the first few clues. By Saturday, we'll probably have a few more. Training camp is for learning, and that’s what the Oilers’ coaching staff is doing right now.