The Edmonton Oilers expect star forward Leon Draisaitl to miss the rest of the regular season because of a lower-body injury, the team said on Tuesday afternoon.
Draisaitl was on the receiving end of Nashville forward Ozzy Wiesblatt’s hit at 4:20 of the first period of Sunday’s 3-1 home win over the Predators. After his exit, Draisaitl did return to take two shifts at the end of the first but did not appear after that.
After the game, Oilers star Connor McDavid said, “It’s not the dirtiest check in the world, but it’s just who you hit and the result of it, unfortunately. If you want to hit our top guys, there’s going to be a response.”
Draisaitl, 30, is fourth in the NHL with 97 points, including 17 (six goals, 11 assists) on a current nine-game point streak. He has a total of 35 goals and 62 assists in 65 games.
“Obviously, he’s a top-four scorer, one of the most elite players in the league, so it’s not like one guy can just step into his shoes,” forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins said prior to the Oilers’ morning skate on Tuesday. “We kind of talked about it this morning; it’s a collective thing with our group that everybody’s going to need to pick up the slack.”
The Oilers entered Tuesday in third place in the Pacific Division with 14 regular-season games remaining, including Tuesday at home against the San Jose Sharks.
Edmonton selected Draisaitl, a native of Germany, with the third overall pick of the 2014 NHL Draft. He has been selected to five All-Star Games and three season-ending NHL All-Star teams, with a first-team honor in 2019-20.
Draisaitl won the Art Ross Trophy (top point scorer with 110), Hart Memorial Trophy as Most Valuable Player and Ted Lindsay Award as most outstanding player in 2019-20, and the Maurice Richard Trophy last season as top goal scorer (52).
