Leon Draisaitl's Size and Skill Is a Recipe for Playoff Success

There's a young, dominant centreman driving the Oilers' offence and his name isn't Connor McDavid.

Leon Draisaitl is leading the charge for Edmonton, recording a point on 7 of the team's last 11 goals while leading the Oilers with 7 points in as many playoff games. Sitting tops on the club this postseason in shooting percentage (12.0) and PDO (108.0), Draisaitl really has been the horse driving the Oilers' offence, especially with McDavid—his on again, off again linemate—struggling to fight through a wool blanket of tight checking that's been draped all over him since Game 1 of the Sharks series.

Though he has three points on the powerplay and one shorthanded (three of them are secondary assists) over his first seven career playoff games, McDavid has just one even strength point—an empty-net goal with one second to play in Game 6 against San Jose— through the team's seven postseason contests, and his 0.71 points-per-game average this spring is a full half-point lower than his regular-season mark of 1.22.

Draisaitl—who placed among the top 10 league leaders in points this season—was a beast in the second half of Wednesday's Game 1 win over Anaheim, setting up the first three Oilers goals and preventing the game-tying tally with a savvy stick-lift defensive play with two minutes to play, before sealing the win and his first career four-point game with an empty-netter late in the third. He was on the ice for all five of the Oilers' goals, while contributing 13 scoring chances and drawing two penalties, one which led to Edmonton's opening goal.

The 21-year-old has been a Ducks killer all year long, scoring twice in one contest, and once in each of the other four games against Anaheim, totalling seven goals and five assists for 12 points in six games this season.

His massive Game 1 performance, especially the final frame, put the third-year Oiler in some elite, all-time-great company. Draisaitl along with defenceman Adam Larsson joined Paul Coffey and Wayne Gretzky (1985), and Petr Klima and Esa Tikkanen (1991) as one of only three pairs of teammates to record three playoff points in the same period. He also became just the second Oiler under the age of 22 to record at least four points in a playoff game (Gretzky did it four times), and the first to record a goal and three assists in a postseason contests since Bernie Nicholls in 1992.

Draisaitl was second on the Oilers in goals (29) and points (77) in his second full NHL season, and provided key secondary scoring the team desperately needed after trading away Taylor Hall, while being a versatile fit on the wing of McDavid or up the middle on the second line. It shouldn't be a surprise that Draisaitl is producing at this time of year, either, as his 6'1" and 215-pound frame and minimal injury history would suggest that he's physically built for the playoffs.

The Oilers will need every inch and ounce of Draisaitl's size and skill as teams like Anaheim, with annoying, shit-talking pests like Ryan Kesler, key in on McDavid even harder as the series moves on.