Edmonton's Global Series Trip Sends Leon Draisaitl Home to Cologne
Oilers will play two games in Cologne in 2027-28, presenting a unique opportunity for Leon Draisaitl to return home.
Quick answers
Where will the Oilers play in the 2027-28 NHL Global Series?
Edmonton is scheduled to play two Global Series games in Cologne, Germany, during the 2027-28 season. The trip will bring Leon Draisaitl back to his hometown for rare competitive NHL games there.
Why will the dates of Edmonton's Cologne games matter?
The NHL had not assigned the Cologne games to a specific week when the article was published. Placement near a break would provide recovery time, while a quick return to the regular schedule could add travel strain within an 84-game season.
The NHL’s 2027-28 Global Series will take two clubs to Germany. Boston plays two games in Munich. Edmonton plays two games in Cologne, which happens to be where Leon Draisaitl is from.
The rarest item on a schedule
NHL players almost never play a competitive game in their hometown unless they play for the local team. For a German player, the odds of it happening at all in a career are close to zero. The league has been to Germany before, but not often, and never with a schedule that lined up this way for the country’s most accomplished export.
Draisaitl has spent his career in Edmonton alongside Connor McDavid on a team that reached the Stanley Cup Final in 2024 and again in 2025 before losing in the first round to Anaheim in 2026. He opens the 2026-27 Hart Trophy market at +900, fourth behind McDavid at +250, Nathan MacKinnon at +350 and Macklin Celebrini at +640.
The Cologne games are more than a year out. They are also the sort of fixture a league announces early precisely because the story writes itself.
Germany is now a fixture on the calendar
The 2027-28 announcement follows a 2026-27 Global Series that already runs two European stops. Carolina and Seattle play in Helsinki on Nov. 12 and Nov. 14. Ottawa and Chicago play in Düsseldorf on Dec. 18 and Dec. 20.
That means Germany gets four Global Series games across two seasons: Düsseldorf this year, Munich and Cologne the year after. For a market the league has spent two decades treating as a periodic experiment, it is close to a standing commitment.
What a European trip actually costs
The competitive question is not the travel itself but where it lands in the season. Ottawa and Chicago go to Düsseldorf on Dec. 18 and Dec. 20, which is immediately before the league’s holiday break, arguably the best possible placement, since the recovery time is already in the calendar.
Edmonton’s Cologne dates have not been attached to a specific week. That will matter more than the distance. A club crossing the Atlantic in November and playing three days after returning is carrying a different burden than one doing it against a scheduled break, and in an 84-game season (42 home, 42 road, 1,344 games across 194 days) there is less slack in the calendar to absorb it.
Where Edmonton sits in the meantime
The Oilers are the only Canadian club the market treats as a genuine contender for the coming season, quoted between +800 and +1200 across the six books VegasInsider tracked in mid-August, with FanDuel at +1000 and both bet365 and DraftKings at +1100.
Between now and Cologne there are two full seasons, a goaltending change built on Frederik Andersen and Devon Levi, and the largest unresolved contract question in the sport. The trip to Germany will still be there.
Edmonton opens on Sept. 29, hosting Vancouver in the back half of Sportsnet’s all-Canadian doubleheader.
Odds and market references describe the situation at the time of writing. You must meet the legal gambling age in your province or territory. See responsible gambling.