Could Connor McDavid or Leon Draisaitl Reach 100 Points This Season?

Grumblings of a 3-6 start have subsided now that the Oilers have a three game win streak under their belts. An OT win over Toronto on Sunday coupled with twelve goals in two games versus Ottawa have the Oilers feeling better. Things have started to pick up for some players who had slow starts, but it’s been an absolutely killer start to the season for both Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl. What’s the ceiling for these players this year?

In twelve games, McDavid has scored an incredible twenty-four points. Leon Draisaitl has put up twenty-two, just two shy of the league leader. Had it been anyone other than McDavid or Draisaitl, it’d be easy to write this off as some sort of unsustainable early season burst. It’s not, and I’m not sure we’ve seen the best of either player yet.

Could Connor McDavid or Leon Draisaitl do the unthinkable and hit 100 points in 56 regular season games?

THE CENTURY CLUB

It would take a season average of 1.79 points per game over 56 to reach 100 points. Currently, McDavid is on pace for 112 points in 56 games, while a full season of Leon projects to 102. Let’s take a look at the first dozen games for each player.

Some notes -

• McDavid is shooting the puck at about 18% right now, while Leon Draisaitl is right between 20 and 21%. It’s a little high for McDavid.
• Both McDavid and Leon struggled against Montréal so far this year, with only McDavid picking up a single point between the two games. Montréal looks like the team to beat in the North early on. That’s not to say that McDavid or Leon couldn’t go absolutely nuclear one night, just that they didn’t blow it out of the water early on.
• A SERIES OF POINTS ABOUT OTTAWA: The first game against Ottawa has McDavid and Leon scoring a lot of points. The power play woke up that game and went a cool 4/5. It was a very bad game for both Ottawa’s PK and Matt Murray, who allowed three goals in the first seven minutes. McDavid picked up five points, Leon picked up six. The power play is humming along now after an awful start. Both Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl make bank on special teams, and if the Oilers keep the needle at 27%, good things are going to happen for not only 97 and 29, but the club overall.
• While it’s easy to write off the Ottawa games because Ottawa really looks bad, it seems important to note that the Oilers and the Senators face off seven more times this season. I’m only half joking when I say that both players might finish the season with 30 points or more against just the Senators this season.
• The Oilers don’t have the pleasure of taking on Ottawa every night, so let’s take out the Senators games. McDavid’s points per game dips to a little more than 1.7, or about 80 over the course of a shortened season. Leon Draisaitl’s points per game would still hang at 1.5, or about 70 points over a shortened season without Ottawa. In other words, if Connor McDavid can keep pushing the river at 1.7 points per game and Leon can hang out at 1.5, McDavid will need about 20 points in 9 games against Ottawa to average out. Leon will need 30. (McDavid already has 7 of those 20, Leon has 8 of 30). It’s a bit of a guess at this point, but I’d wager a nickel that McDavid can average 13 points in 7 games versus Ottawa. Leon’s fence is a little higher needing 22 points in 7 games, but you and I just saw him score six points against the Senators on Sunday. It seems like a lot until you realize that the sky is the limit with these two.
• GOT ANYTHING ELSE BESIDES “OTTAWA”?: Yes. Vancouver. They’re not good either, and they’re allowing the fourth most goals per game right now at 3.69. Has Jim Benning been fired for Peter Chiarelli yet?

The Oilers have two players on their team that could hit the 100 point mark, and they wouldn’t need much luck to do it. It seems mind boggling that two players could keep contributing at a clip of over 1.7 points per game. With seven more Ottawa games on the schedule and just maintaining what’s already happened so far this year, it certainly could be in the cards.