Connor McDavid and Jack Eichel, the top two picks of the 2015 NHL draft and faces of beleaguered franchises, squared off on Tuesday night -- with Eichel's Buffalo Sabres getting the better of McDavid's Edmonton Oilers 5-0. But their matchup has lost some luster, given their respective teams' lost seasons. So we asked our writers:
It's 10 years from now. Peer into your crystal ball and tell us: What has happened during the past decade to Eichel and McDavid?
Greg Wyshynski, senior writer: Hello from 2028. It's a bit hotter. The iPhone XXX is selling well. Ryan Seacrest pretty much looks the same, which is odd, given how stressful it is to govern California. Especially for a second term.
It's the 10-year anniversary of the most important day of Jack Eichel's life until that point: When the Buffalo Sabres won the NHL draft lottery and then selected defenseman Rasmus Dahlin with the No. 1 overall pick. (The Houston Aeros, then the Arizona Coyotes, had the best odds in that lottery.)
The partnership between Dahlin and coach Phil Housley helped him become a mutant hybrid of Nicklas Lidstrom and Erik Karlsson, with a dash of Bobby Orr. He helped solidify the back end; the emergence of Casey Mittelstadt and Alexander Nylander gave Eichel offensive support. The Sabres began their rise from the basement in 2020 and never looked back. Eichel saw his point totals steadily increase but remained behind Auston Matthews, Connor McDavid and Jack Hughes in the scoring races.
But while he didn't dominate individually, Eichel's team thrived. It's hard to imagine, but from 2021 through 2024, Buffalo won four consecutive conference championships. Unfortunately they lost in the championship round all four times, the last two to Dallas.
Connor McDavid -- well, that's a different story. The Oilers would bob up and down the standings like a buoy for years, propped up by the five scoring titles McDavid won with Leon Draisaitl on his wing. (Alas, that second-line center thing never worked out.) But what franchise is going to find success with six coaches and three general managers in an eight-year span? Luckily McDavid was never saddled with the label of "coach killer," as he is, in fact, not Russian.
In 2025, it was obvious that the 29-year-old McDavid wasn't going to re-sign with the Oilers, so Edmonton traded him to their agreed-upon destination: the Los Angeles Kings, who sent an ultimately underwhelming package of players, picks and cash to Daryl Katz.
McDavid, of course, won back-to-back Stanley Cups with the Kings, and is currently working on his three-peat with a 37-year-old Taylor Hall on his wing.
So it's been a wild past 10 years for Jack Eichel and Connor McDavid, which has really taken our minds off the fact that our new robot overlords have harvested our bodies as human batteries.
Emily Kaplan, national NHL reporter: Well, if we're going full-on fan fiction here, let me predict this: By 2028, both the Buffalo Bills and the Sabres will have won multiple championships. Their owners, Terry and Kim Pegula, are pretty much royalty in Western New York (you can find their statues in Buffalo and Rochester -- and, heck, even at Niagara Falls). The Bills, by the way, have won the Super Bowl with Tyrod Taylor as their quarterback. Taylor was never disrespected again. He's as beloved in Buffalo as Jim Kelly. Eichel has as much hardware as Sidney Crosby -- which catapults him to household-name status. His endorsements include everything from Rolex to Nike to bitcoin (remember, it's 2028).
Meanwhile, in Edmonton, the doom-and-gloom regression that was the 2017-18 season proved to foreshadow even darker days ahead. After missing out on the No. 1 lottery pick in the 2018 NHL draft, and seeing Rasmus Dahlin go to Buffalo -- helping explain how the Sabres got so good so fast -- the Oilers continued to spiral. Wayne Gretzky took a more involved role with the team, but even that didn't help. Leon Draisaitl was traded to clear cap space. McDavid maintained his status as the flashiest, fastest and most skilled player in the game. But his talents were never properly showcased on a team that became, quite frankly, irrelevant.
In truth, I don't think either of these extremes is likely. Each player will develop and flourish into an individual superstar, but he will also help the tide rise around him. Both the Sabres and Oilers will build, perhaps slowly, through the draft. I'd like to believe both franchises will have won a Cup by 2028, but I'm definitely confident in stating this: Whoever gets Dahlin will have a far better chance.
Chris Peters, NHL Insider: I'm not sure my imagination is as vivid as my colleagues' here, but I think these next 10 years will feature an awful lot of action. For one, I think the Connor vs. Jack storyline that has followed them since their draft year is going to dissipate, especially after one of them wins his first Stanley Cup -- and that will happen within the next 10 years, as hard as it might be to envision now.
Sabers GM Jason Botterill is going to get things turned around in Buffalo, slowly but surely. He's a smart exec with a lot of experience maximizing the salary cap, and he has an owner who is willing to spend. The Sabres should end up with another high draft pick this year who will help them take a few small steps forward. Buffalo fans have no reason to be patient anymore, but I think they'll get some relief sooner rather than later, putting this team back on track to becoming a contender.
The Oilers, meanwhile, should always have a chance with McDavid. This year has been a sobering reminder that one player can't do it all himself, but where would they be without him? There's a lot more work to do on the rest of Edmonton's roster to get this team to the next level -- and I'm not sure GM Peter Chiarelli will get the chance to do it. As long as you have No. 97 as your foundation, however, you've got something no one else in the league has.
Over these next 10 years, McDavid will continue to collect some of the big individual hardware, earning more Hart Trophies than anyone else over that span. Eichel will continue to play second fiddle but will challenge for the Art Ross a few times during the next five years. McDavid, meanwhile, will win the race to the first Stanley Cup between the two, but Eichel will help the Sabres become a legitimate contender within the next five years. By 2028, we'll view each of them as among the best to come out of this current wave of young talent, while McDavid puts himself in position to be considered one of the all-time greats.