Game Preview: There Will Be Blood

This offseason, Edmonton shipped off 2 of their 4 recent #1 draft picks in Nail Yakupov and Taylor Hall. Despite this, they finally find themselves back in playoff contention. The Oilers roared out to a 7-2 start in October, though they have cooled off a bit of late as injuries have started to strike.

A big reason for success? Connor McDavid. He good. The second year centerman is currently leading the NHL in assists and points. On one hand, I’m excited to get a chance to watch him tonight. On the other hand, I’m terrified of my team having to face him.

The most noteworthy recent injury is that defenseman Darnell Nurse is out 12 weeks after ankle surgery. That’s bad news for a blue line corps that must rely now on...Kris Russell? oooooh boy.

Remember that Finnish kid we were SUPPOSED to draft? Well, Jesse Puljujarvi missed the last game with an undisclosed injury. It’s unclear if he’ll be back in the lineup tonight. In 22 games this season, he has just 1 goal and 7 assists. In his last three games he had less than 10 minutes of ice time per game.

On the Columbus side, Captain Nick Foligno should be back in the lineup after missing the last two games with an illness. Oliver BJORKSTRAND will accompany the team on this 3 game Western Canada trip as a spare forward.

Projected Lineups

Brandon Saad	Alexander Wennberg	Nick Foligno
Boone Jenner	Brandon Dubinsky	Cam Atkinson
Scott Hartnell	William Karlsson	Josh Anderson
Matt Calvert	Lukas Sedlak	Sam Gagner

Zach Werenski	Seth Jones
Jack Johnson	David Savard
Ryan Murray	Markus Nutivaara

Sergei Bobrovsky

Curtis McElhinney

Drake Caggiula	Connor McDavid	Milan Lucic
Patrick Maroon	Ryan Nugent-Hopkins	Jordan Eberle
Benoit Pouliot	Leon Draisaitl	Tyler Pitlick
Anton Slepyshev	Dearly Missed Mark Letestu	Zack Kassian

Kris Russell	Andrej Sekera
Oscar Klefbom	Adam Larsson
Dillon Simpson	Matthew Benning

Cam Talbot

Jonas Gustavsson