The Evander Kane Trade - Did Edmonton sacrifice the wrong piece in their efforts to bring back key players or did Vancouver get a step closer to a potential playoff return?

Recently, the Edmonton Oilers traded Evander Kane, a longtime offensive contributor for several playoff runs, to the Vancouver Canucks. Did this move help the Oilers clear cap space to keep other key players? Or did they give their cross-Rockies rival a free pass to another season of playoff contention?

(Image Credit to NHL.com )

Ok. So this was an interesting trade. 

Brief summary: The Edmonton Oilers, coming off a second-consecutive Stanley Cup Final loss to the Florida Panthers, have several key players looking for contract extensions or even new ones altogether. The most notable name at this junction in time is defenceman Evan Bouchard, who played a key role in Edmonton’s second-consecutive Stanley Cup Final berth. 

In what was an effort to clear enough cap space to be able to sign the defenceman and others like Trent Frederic (as I write this, Frederic was signed to an eight-year extension), the Edmonton Oilers traded Evander Kane to the Vancouver Canucks in exchange for a fourth-round pick in the upcoming NHL entry draft. 

Considering the Oilers’ situation, the trade is an interesting move that could be a boon for the team. It could also just as easily backfire. 

Clearing out Kane’s cap hit, estimated at $5.125 million, seems like it could help to secure the cap space required to sign Evan Bouchard to a new contract. Defence was an issue for Edmonton at times during the past few playoff runs, so locking up Bouchard could help to mitigate these issues down the road. 

On the other hand, it could also be yet another repeat of last offseason, which saw the Oilers lose key depth forwards like Dylan Holloway and Ryan McLeod. And with the Evander Kane trade, there is now a massive disparity between the Oilers’ key forwards, a group that includes Connor McDavid, and depth pieces such as Kasperi Kapanen. 

Now I’m not saying that only five of Edmonton’s legion of forwards are great. I’m just saying that with Evander Kane gone, the Oilers lost one of the only forward pieces that could bridge the Oilers’ bottom six with the top two lines. 

Why is that an issue? In the 2025 Stanley Cup Playoffs, the Oilers' top six forwards - Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Corey Perry, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Evander Kane, and Zach Hyman - scored 45 goals. The remaining seven forwards scored just 22 goals. 

Now I understand this might seem like it is an unfair comparison, especially when considering that the goalscoring was distributed throughout much of the Oilers' lineup. But it does seem like a bit much to expect most of your forward depth to step up and score more than half of what Connor McDavid will put up in a given period of games. This playoff run was not Evander Kane’s best, and even then his total goal haul was half of what each of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl was putting up. Trading someone who can keep pace with your top two forwards in terms of goal-scoring is, at best, a bad idea.

And that’s not even the worst part. The Oilers traded him to a division rival. 

That said, I do understand that Evander Kane wanted to go to Vancouver; after all, he did grow up a Canucks fan and was born in Vancouver. He will be joining a deep, star-studded lineup that includes star defencemen Quinn Hughes and Filip Hronek, key forwards like Elias Pettersson and Brock Boeser, as well as goalies Thatcher Demko and Kevin Lankinen.

As someone who watches Canucks games, fans should feel optimistic about this trade. While the Oilers did successfully burn some of the money dedicated to Evander Kane on the Trent Frederic extension, that could come at the cost of losing a physical forward to a division rival. And if the locker room issues die down for Vancouver, they could easily become a high-scoring team bound for a playoff return. 

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Article written by Noah Guttman