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Milan Lucic chose the Edmonton Oilers during free agency, signing a seven-year, $42 million contract.

The deal may have been inked quickly on July 1, but with so many teams after the power forward it was one of the more difficult decisions of his career.

“Yeah, 100 percent,” Lucic agreed during a Wednesday morning appearance on Vancouver’s TSN 1040. “There were close to 10 teams that reached out and were really serious about me joining their team. It was humbling that that many teams reached out and wanted me on their team. I’m not going to lie… it was a pretty cool feeling to have that many teams wanting you on their team.

“But also, it made things a lot (more) difficult. Especially talking to a lot of GMs and seeing what they had to offer and what they were proposing. I think I learned a lot, kind of what they have to go through, and I think I respect the GM position even more than what I did before because of the process that they have to go through to get free agents, and all of that type of stuff. It’s definitely not an easy thing.

“But at the end of the day, I go back to myself. I just kind of went with my heart and what was right for me and my career to be the best that I could be moving forward, and give myself an opportunity to win. That’s why I went with my heart and my loyalty to Peter and chose the Edmonton Oilers.”

Incidentally, in terms of the decision to choose Edmonton specifically, there just may have been one particular factor which swayed the winger.

“A lot went into the decision,” said Lucic. “I think the biggest thing was getting a chance to play with a player like Connor McDavid. For me, getting an opportunity to play with the best – one of the best – players that I’ve seen come around since I’ve been a player in the NHL – that’s obviously something that was probably the No. 1 thing that played into my decision. He’s still 19 years old, and the sky is the limit for the kid. I think that’s what I’m looking most forward to, is to see what this kid can accomplish because there’s so much potential there. It’s something that I wanted to be a part of. I think he’s got a lot of greatness in him already.”

Source: TSN 1040/ Transcript: Nichols

Lucic: ‘Close to 10 teams’ were serious UFA bidders