The Edmonton Oilers have kicked off the end of the work week with a rather disappointing announcement.
According to a report from Sportsnet's National Hockey League insider Mark Spector, the Oilers have made the difficult decision to send rookie sensation Evan Bouchard back down to junior where he will remain for the remainder of the 2018 - 2019 NHL regular season. It's a major disappointment for fans who were hopeful that Bouchard could crack the Oilers roster on a more permanent basis, especially given the Oilers defensesive group was coming off relatively weak performance in the 2017 - 2018 NHL season.
Bouchard unquestionably showed a great deal of promise during both training camp and the preseason and at times it looked like there could be a realistic shot of him making the roster, however he began to falter and show his inexperience more frequently once the regular season got underway. Whether that was because the level of play increased significantly or simply due to the fact that teams had a chance to exploit some of Bouchard's weaknesses, the end result was today's demotion back to junior. Over his first 7 games as an Edmonton Oiler Bouchard accounted for 1 goal and no assists for a total of 1 point and he also acquired 2 penalty minutes on his way to a plus minus rating of -5 over those 7 games.
Now while this is indeed a disappointing announcement from the Oilers organization there's also very little doubt that this was the best long term move for both the team itself, as well as Bouchard. At just 19 years of age he is still very young by the standards of an NHL defenseman and the Ontario Hockey League's London Knights have helped develop some of the very best talents in the NHL, so there is still a ton of upside for Bouchard here. Not only will he can an extra year to develop in the Knights' system but perhaps more importantly the Oilers will avoid burning a year on his entry level contract which will give them more control over his long term future once he does become a permanent fixture of the Oilers roster.
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