The Edmonton Oilers open the 2026-27 season Tuesday night against the Vancouver Canucks with more than just two points on the line. They also start a two-year clock that will decide whether captain Connor McDavid remains in Oilers colors after his current deal expires.
McDavid signed a two-year extension last October worth $12.5 million a season. The contract begins this fall and runs through 2027-28. He took the same average salary he has carried for years, well below what the league’s top centers are now earning, to give Edmonton more cap room while it tries to win a championship.
That window is now the story in Alberta. TSN analyst and former NHL forward Jeff O’Neill said this week he believes McDavid will not stay if the Oilers fail to win the Stanley Cup in the next two seasons.
“I think it’s zero. He told them: I got 2 years here, and if we don’t win a Cup, I’m gonna do it somewhere else. […] When your assistant captain says, look around here, we’ve got 2 years to make this thing happen… I think that means something,” O’Neill said.
The Oilers have not won the Cup since 1990. McDavid, the No. 1 pick in the 2015 draft, has already taken them to the Final in 2024 and 2025. Florida beat them in seven games the first time and in six games the next year. McDavid won the Conn Smythe Trophy in 2024 despite the loss.
Last spring was a step backward. Edmonton was eliminated in the first round. McDavid finished the regular season with 48 goals and 90 assists for 138 points in 82 games and won the Art Ross Trophy for the sixth time. Through 11 NHL seasons he has 409 goals and 811 assists in 794 games.
After that early playoff exit, McDavid agreed with teammate Leon Draisaitl that the club had slipped.
“Yeah I feel the same way,” McDavid said. “It’s only a couple days ago I made those comments and I obviously feel the same as I did a couple days ago and agree with Leon. The organization as a whole has taken a step back and that starts with me, starts with Leon. We can all be better and we all need to be better.”
Draisaitl, signed through 2031-32 at $14 million a season, offered a similar assessment.
“Maybe we lost a little bit of that fire that we had the last two years,” Draisaitl said. “Because it’s been a lot of hockey, it’s been a long season. I don’t know if taking it for granted is what I would say but I do think that there’s many parts that just somehow we took a little step back.”
The short-term deal McDavid accepted last fall was widely viewed as a message. He could have waited and become an unrestricted free agent after 2025-26. Instead he stayed, but only for two more years after this one. Other stars have signed larger contracts this offseason, leaving McDavid positioned to command the richest deal in the league when he next hits the market.
General manager Stan Bowman has said the captain’s focus is winning, not setting a new salary record. The roster around McDavid and Draisaitl has been reshuffled again, with a new coaching staff taking over as the team tries to recapture the form that produced those two Final runs.
Tuesday’s home opener against Vancouver begins a home-and-home set that finishes Thursday on the road. From there the Oilers have 82 games, and then whatever playoff run they can build, to show McDavid the franchise is still moving toward a title.
O’Neill’s comments are an opinion, not an official statement from McDavid or the team. Still, they land at a moment when the organization can no longer treat the future as an open question. Two seasons remain. After that, McDavid will be a free agent at age 31 unless Edmonton gives him a reason to stay.
The Oilers have spent more than a decade building around the player many consider the best in the world. The next 24 months will show whether that work is enough.
