The Edmonton Oilers will be missing major firepower for the rest of the season. Superstar Leon Draisaitl will have to miss the remaining regular season, according to the team.
He suffered a lower-body injury in Sunday’s win over the Nashville Predators. Draisaitl left that game in the first period after taking a hard bump from Predators winger Ozzy Wiesblatt. No update was provided after the game.
This news will be a major blow to the Oilers offense as they look to seal their spot in the top-three of the Pacific Division. Draisaitl has stayed red-hot since Edmonton returned from the Olympic break. He has six goals and 17 points in his last 10 games, bringing his yearlong totals up to 35 goals and 97 points in just 65 games. The 30-year-old ranks second on the Oilers in scoring behind Connor McDavid, who has already reached 114 points in 68 games. The two are one of the best duos in the league whether they’re playing alongside each other or not — making Edmonton’s task of replacing Draisaitl that much more challenging.
Max Jones will step into the lineup to fill Draisaitl’s hole. Jones has appeared in nine NHL games, and scored one point, this season. He has also racked up 10 goals, 18 points, and 61 penalty minutes in 39 AHL games. He is a veteran of 293 NHL games with 66 points, split evenly, to show for it. Jones should assume a bottom-line role, while Vasily Podkolzin and Matthew Savoie move up the lineup to bridge the top-six. Podkolzin has three points in his last six games and 30 points on the year, while Savoie has two points in his last two games and 27 points in total. The two should keep play moving just enough to earn Edmonton’s other star talent — McDavid, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Zach Hyman — scoring chances.
If that will be enough to sustain Edmonton’s offense across their remaining 14 games will be a larger question. The Oilers have scored the second-most goals in the NHL (238) behind only the Colorado Avalanche (249). Much of that scoring came from the one-two punch that is McDavid and Draisaitl. Without one of those hooks, the Oilers will need to look toward Hyman to make up for scoring. This could also be a major opportunity for Savoie or Isaac Howard to step up as scoring pieces, after quieter starts to their pro careers than many expected.