Oilers' McLellan confirms team will have a captain next season

Let the speculation begin.

After playing without a captain last season, Edmonton Oilers head coach Todd McLellan confirmed to the media Wednesday that the team will employ one for the 2016-17 campaign.

"Will we have a captain? Yeah we will," McLellan said, according Chris Wescott of Edmontonoilers.com.

When asked who it might be, McLellan didn't budge.

"We will have a captain," he said.

Last season, Andrew Ference, Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, and Matt Hendricks all spent time representing the team as alternate captains.

Naturally, all eyes shift to Connor McDavid, who's already been tabbed as a leader by teammates, and is the epicenter of the franchise's future.

If it is McDavid, 19, he could become the youngest captain in NHL history, a mark set by Gabriel Landeskog of the Colorado Avalanche, who set the record in 2012 at 19 years and 286 days old.