Dylan Holloway is ready for the NHL

Dylan Holloway will play for the Edmonton Oilers all season. He’s ready for the NHL.

I don’t expect him to produce as much as he did last season. It would be foolish to expect him to score four goals every five games. He doesn’t have to come close to be a prolific top 9 forward.

If Holloway can score 17 goals, that would be a solid performance. Last season in the NHL, we saw 169 forwards score more than 17 goals. That’s an average of 5.28 per team. It’s a real top 9 production, and in fact it’s a top 6 shot on goal production. Of those 169 forwards, 132 have played in over 70 games. Only 43 of them played 80-82 games so it’s normal to get upset and miss some games.

The Oilers had five forwards last year who scored more than 17 goals. Leon Draisaitl (55), Connor Mcdavid (44), Zach Hyman (27), Evander Kane (22) and Kailer Yamamoto (20). Jesse Puljujarvi had 14, Warren Foegele 12, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins 11 and Derek Ryan 10 to round out the top nine goalscorers. It won’t be that difficult for Holloway to break the top 9 goalscoring forwards in Edmonton.

He’ll be an oiler all year round. Claiming “I need to see more” or “That was just the preseason” is too conservative. Holloway has shown he has the skill, speed, smarts and hockey sense to play in the NHL. He’s going to make some rookie mistakes like all rookies do, but he’s got NHL skills now and he’s going to show it.

Holloway turned 21 last month. He’s not a teenager trying to crack an NHL roster, and 17 goals is a very realistic number. Let me show you why.

Holloway was drafted 14th overall in 2020. Anton Lundell finished 12th, Seth Jarvis 13th and Dawson Mercer 18th. These three played in the NHL last year. The other picks between Holloway and Mercer were Rodian Amirov, who has fought Cancer 15th since his draft, Kaiden Guhle, a defenseman, finished 16th, and Lukas Reichel finished 17th. He played 11 games with Chicago late last season.

Lundell and Mercer, like Holloway, have late birthdays and turned 20 last season. Jarvis was 19. Here are their numbers.

Anton Lundell

Lundell went 18-26-44 in 65 games for the Florida Panthers.
He was 8th among Panther forwards in overall TOI (15:40/game) and 8th in points.
He was 8th in 5×5 TOI (12:10/game) and 8th in points with 13-17-30.
He was 11th in PP TOI with 45 min and 8th in points with 1-3-4.
He was 1st in PK TOI and 3rd in PK points with 1-3-4.
He played 791 minutes at 5×5 in 65 games.
His most common linemates were Sam Reinhart (392 min), Mason Marchment (296), Frank Vatrano (178), Carter Verhaeghe (164), Maxim Mamin (146), and Owen Tippett (94). He ran 70 minutes with Jonathan Huberdeau and just six with Aleksander Barkov.

Lundell had an excellent rookie season. Holloway won’t get anywhere near the same PK time, but Lundell has scored 18 goals in 65 games and mostly played in a third-row role. He was on a very deep team, much like Holloway was in Edmonton.

Seth Jarvis

Jarvis produced 17-23-40 in 68 games for the Carolina Hurricanes.
He was 9th among forwards in TOI (13:52/game) and was 6th in points.
He was 9th in 5×5 TOI (12:04/game) and 5th in points with 14-18-32.
He was 7th in PP TOI (93 min) and produced 2-4-6.
He wasn’t with the PK.
He played 821 minutes at 5×5 in 68 games.
His most common linemates were Sebastien Aho (422 min), Andrei Svechnikov (245), Tuevo Teravainen (225), Vincent Trocheck (174), Steven Lorentz (105) and Jesperi Kotkaniemi (104).

DawsonMercer

Mercer went 17-25-42 in 82 games with the New Jersey Devils.
He was 1st among forwards in the entire Ice Age, mainly because he played every game. He was 5th in TOI/game (16:52) and 5th in points.
He was second in 5×5 TOI/game at 13:43 and third in points with 14-18-32.
He finished third in PP TOI (152 min) and fifth in points with 2-4-6.
He was 7th in PK TOI (24 min).
His 1126 minutes at 5×5 was the most of any Devils forward.
His most common linemates were Andreas Johnsson (482), Yegor Sharangovich (327), Jesper Bratt (295), Tomas Tatar (280), Jack Hughes (259), and Pavel Zacha (123). He played with different guys and apart from Nico Hischier he played with most of their most experienced players.

Mercer’s ability to stay healthy got him more ice time overall, but so did his game. He had a solid rookie campaign and most of his points came in 5×5s. I don’t see Holloway getting as much PP time as Mercer (152 minutes) but Holloway will get some time on the second session. He’ll probably get around 60 minutes of PP time on the second session if he stays healthy. The majority of his points are scored with even strength.

Mercer, Jarvis and Lundell averaged 17 goals and 42 points. I don’t think it’s unrealistic to expect Holloway to produce at this pace.

Remember that last year Kailer Yamamoto and Jesse Puljujarvi averaged 17 goals and 39 points together. And they mostly played in the top six in Edmonton. If Holloway can get into the top six regulars and play with either McDavid or Draisaitl, then 17-25-42 is very plausible. I could argue that maybe that’s even a bit low.

The only reason Holloway doesn’t reach 17-25-42 is when he’s injured.

He’s ready for the NHL and more than capable of hitting those realistic offensive projections.