The Edmonton Oilers host the L.A. Kings Wednesday night at Rogers Place in their first meeting since the Oilers won a seven-game playoff series last spring. (630 CHED Face-off Show at 6 p.m., game at 8 p.m.)
Oilers forward Leon Draisaitl suffered a high ankle sprain in Game 6 of that series when he was taken down by Kings defenceman Mikey Anderson. Draisaitl is still hampered by the injury.
“I spent a lot of time working on it, rehabbing it, trying to make it feel better. It’s still there. You still feel it. It’s an injury that takes a long time to be completely gone,” explained Draisaitl.
The Oilers are searching to improve the defensive details in their game. They’re 30th in goals against per game with 3.63. They’re allowing 34.9 shots against per game, third most in the league.
“There are times when we’re giving up way too many grade A scoring chances, and there are times teams are just funneling pucks on net,” said defenceman Brett Kulak. “You look at what you’re giving up in quality chances at the end of the day. There are still too many of those.”
“On the defensive side of things, you want to make sure you’re taking care of the heart of the D zone,” said head coach Jay Woodcroft. “You want to make sure if you’re going to give up chances or shots, they’re outside of that area. You want to make sure as you’re coming back into the D zone, you want to stop in that area and protect that area. If you do a good job there, what happens is you limit second opportunities and third opportunities.”
The Oilers expected lineup is:
Nugent-Hopkins – McDavid – Puljujarvi
Foegele – Draisaitl – Hyman
Janmark – McLeod – Kostin
Holloway – Shore – Ryan
Nurse – Ceci
Kulak – Bouchard
Niemelainen – Barrie
Skinner