Double Team: Paul Coffey was hot for the Oilers and Penguins

While the NHL is on hold because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the Tribune-Review will offer the Double Team project, an examination of the five best players who have contributed substantially to the Penguins and another franchise. For consideration, a player must have played at least the equivalent of a full season for each franchise. (Sorry, Jarome Iginla fans.)

Today, a look at the Edmonton Oilers. A founding franchise of the World Hockey Association (WHA) in 1972, the Alberta Oilers were named after the province’s principal industry. By 1973, they changed their identifying location to Edmonton, and, as one of the WHA’s most stable franchises, they merged into the NHL in 1979. For the sake of this exercise, a player’s WHA service will not be considered (Sorry, Val Fonteyne fans.)

In 80 all-time games against the Oilers, the Penguins have a 37-35-8 record.

1.) Paul Coffey, defensemen

The NHL in the 1980s was geared toward offense with a cavalier attitude toward defense. No one embodied that dynamic better than Coffey.

A first-round pick (No. 6) overall in the Oilers’ second NHL Draft (1980), Coffey was a star by his second season as he recorded 29 goals and 89 points in 80 games. After a 96-point effort in 1982-83, Coffey became the second defensemen in NHL history to reach the 40-goal barrier (joining Boston Bruins great Bobby Orr) during the 1983-84 season while also finishing second in the league in scoring with an absurd 126 points. And, oh yeah, he helped the eventual Oilers dynasty of that decade win the first of its five Stanley Cup titles that spring.

In 1984-85, Coffey earned his first win of the James Norris Memorial Trophy as the league’s top defenseman by putting up 121 points in 80 games. He also made history by establishing records for goals (12), assists (25), and points (37) by a defenseman in a single postseason (18 games) as the Oilers repeated as champions.

His signature season of 1985-86 saw Coffey win the Norris Trophy once again as he established the NHL record for goals by a defenseman with 48 while coming up one point short of Orr’s points record of 138.

After helping the Oilers win the Stanley Cup again in 1986-87, a contract dispute with management led to Coffey being traded to the Penguins by November of 1987. Having dominated with the likes of Wayne Gretzky, Coffey would get a chance to do the same with Mario Lemieux. Not coincidentally, Lemieux won the Hart Memorial Trophy as league MVP for the first time in 1987-88 after Coffey’s arrival.

In 1988-89, his first full season in Pittsburgh, Coffey established franchise records for defensemen with 30 goals and 113 points while helping the Penguins reach the playoffs for the first time in seven years. After putting up 103 points in 1989-90, Coffey helped steer a young Penguins team – minus Lemieux as he recovered from back surgery – throughout the 1990-91 season with 93 points in 76 games. Once Lemieux was recovered, the Penguins won their first Stanley Cup title that spring.

Midway through the 1991-92 season, Coffey requested a trade and was dealt to the Los Angeles Kings. In 2004, he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame.

2.) Bill Guerin, right winger

The Oilers acquired Guerin via trade with the New Jersey Devils in January 1998, and he played immediate dividends. Helping the Oilers reach the playoffs, he put up seven goals and eight points in 12 postseason games, including an upset of the powerful Colorado Avalanche in a Western Conference quarterfinal series.

Guerin’s best season in Edmonton was 1998-99, and he led the team with 30 goals and 64 points while reaching the postseason again. In 1999-2000, Guerin put up 24 goals and 46 points in 70 games as the Oilers reached the playoffs for a third consecutive year.

Early in the 2000-01 season, financial constraints forced the Oilers to deal Guerin to the Boston Bruins.

Later in the decade, Guerin was winding down his career and was moved by the New York Islanders to the Penguins at the 2009 trade deadline. Finding a home on franchise center Sidney Crosby’s line, Guerin helped the Penguins win the franchise’s third Stanley Cup championship by recording 15 points in 24 playoff games.

After a 21-goal, 45-point effort in 78 games during 2009-10 with the Penguins, Guerin retired.

3) Craig Simpson, left winger

After transforming the franchise by drafting Lemieux No. 1 overall in the 1984, the Penguins wanted to supplement him with the No. 2 overall pick in 1985 by drafting Simpson out of Michigan State.

Struggling as a rookie with only 11 goals and 28 points in 76 games in 1985-86, Simpson began to live up to his potential in his second season by posting 26 goals and 51 points in 72 games.

That potential was enough for the Penguins to make Simpson the centerpiece of the bundle of players sent to Edmonton in order to acquire Coffey.

With the high-flying Oilers, Simpson fit in immediately. After the trade, he netted 61 points, including a team-leading 43 goals, in only 59 games — to go along with the 50 overall he scored — during the 1987-88 season then added 13 goals in 19 playoff games, helping the Oilers win another Stanley Cup title.

Simpson never enjoyed the same individual success with the Oilers, but he remained a reliable producer. After Gretzky’s departure in the 1988 offseason, Simpson was a consistent threat to reach the 20- or 30-goal mark.

Perhaps his greatest moment as an NHLer came during the 1990 postseason when he led the playoffs with 16 goals and 31 points in 22 games — including the Stanley Cup-clinching goal — as the Oilers won their fifth and most recent championship.

The boom days were over for the Oilers after that title. Simpson enjoyed three productive seasons with the Oilers who reached the Campbell Conference finals twice over that span but fell short of reaching a Stanley Cup Final. In the 1993 offseason, the Oilers began to disassemble the final pieces of their dynasty, and Simpson was traded the Buffalo Sabres.

4) Pat Hughes, right winger

A role player with the Montreal Canadiens’ dynasty of the late 1970s, Hughes joined the Penguins via trade during the 1979 offseason and brought a Stanley Cup ring as well as a veteran presence to a mediocre Penguins lineup. Enjoying more playing time than he could ever claim in Montreal, Hughes, an abbrasive checking forward, put up a solid 32 points in 76 games in 1979-80, helping the Penguins reach the playoffs and push the heavily favored Bruins to five games in a best-of-five preliminary round series.

Midway through the 1980-81 season, Hughes once again was stuck low on the depth chart, and by the trade deadline, he was moved to the Oilers.

With the Oilers, Hughes had his greatest success individually and collectively. After the transaction, he reached the 20-goal mark three consecutive seasons and at one time held the NHL record for the two quickest short-handed goals, scoring twice within a span of 25 seconds during a 7-5 road win against the St. Louis Blues on Jan. 11, 1983. Additionally, he collected two more Stanley Cup rings in 1984 and ‘85.

In October of 1985, Hughes was on the move again, dealt to the Buffalo Sabres.

5.) Willy Lindstrom, right winger

“The Wisp” holds a unique place in NHL history as the first player to be teammates with Gretzky and Lemieux. After coming to North America in 1975, the Swedish-born Lindstrom spent parts of eight seasons with the Winnipeg Jets before being dealt to the Oilers at the 1983 trade deadline. In Edmonton, Lindstrom inhabited a defensive checking role and helped the Oilers reach the Stanley Cup Final for the first time, losing to the Islanders’ dynasty.

In 1983-84, Lindstrom posted 22 goals and 38 points then helped the Oilers win their first Stanley Cup title, this time besting the Islanders. A year later, Lindstrom scored the winning goal in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup Final against the Philadelphia Flyers and earned his second championship.

The Penguins claimed Lindstrom through the 1985 waiver draft in October, and he spent the last two seasons of his NHL career in Pittsburgh. His high point with the Penguins came in 1985-86, when he had 31 points in 71 games. He followed that in 1986-87 with 23 points in 60 games before returning to Sweden.

Honorable mentions: Chris Joseph, defenseman; Georges Laraque, right winger; Mark Letestu, center; Justin Schultz, defenseman; Petr Sykora, right winger.

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