What’s next for Oilers after Dickinson, Murphy extensions?

The Edmonton Oilers began their offseason over the weekend, locking up two of their pending unrestricted free agents in center Jason Dickinson and defenseman Connor Murphy. Both players were trade deadline additions from the Chicago Blackhawks, and both players have proven to be excellent fits in Edmonton, as they both have extremely reliable defensive games, and play those in key roles in the Oilers lineup a the third-line center and top-four defenseman positions.

So now that the Oilers have locked up to of their bigger pending free agents, what is next for their offseason? How will they look to improve their roster in a crucial summer that could determine Connor McDavid’s future with the team? The Fourth Period and Daily Faceoff insider David Pagnotta joined DFO Live to talk about what’s next for Edmonton in the offseason.

David Pagnotta: It’s win now. That’s the mode and the mindset in Edmonton. So yes, they have to figure out Darnell Nurse. They have to figure out their goaltending situation. They are going to be exploring that more right now because I don’t think they’re just rolling into next season with Tristan Jarry. They’ve addressed their 3C. I think they want to address their 4th line a little bit and then are also still looking around to see, can they get a winger that makes sense, that can keep up with McDavid.

So they still have a number of things on their checklist that need to be checked off. Even with Murphy back in the mix and them shopping out Nurse, are they going to bring in somebody else on that back end that really stabilizes things? I would expect it, but that’s up to Stan Bowman to try to find. You can move out Nurse and address other pieces of your roster and then look to see if there’s another fit elsewhere, either via trade or free agency, to further shore up that back end.

You can watch the full episode here…