IRVINE, Calif. — After he finished a round of media questions about the upcoming playoff series against the Edmonton Oilers, Leo Carlsson answered another round for an Anaheim Ducks staffer, with the answers to be sent in a video to a Swedish outlet.

The questions were in English, and Carlsson translated the answers into his native language. And then the personable young Ducks center joked to that staffer, “I could have said anything.”

Two days before the biggest games of what seems to be a march toward stardom, the 21-year-old Carlsson was at ease this weekend in the Ducks’ locker room, even as as a Game 1 date with established supernovas Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl loomed.

The Ducks, who are back in the playoffs for the first time in eight years, have a unique task ahead. The Oilers boast two players with the Hart Trophy on their resumes — the same two who have scored the most playoff points over the last two postseasons. As the Oilers made consecutive runs to the Stanley Cup Final, McDavid totaled 75 points. Draisaitl was right behind with 64.

There is only one Carlsson, and he’s part of an Anaheim club that blends young standouts with veteran leaders and relies on balanced scoring across the lineup. But the Swede is the Ducks’ top-line center, and this is the kind of atmosphere and the kind of opponent that will allow him to show he’s ready to elevate and become one of the league’s alpha dogs.

“I think it’s a good challenge for us and for me, too,” Carlsson said. “First playoff game, too, so just going to be pumped up to go either way.”

Just how much will Carlsson play against either McDavid or Draisaitl, if the Oilers have each power their own line? A cagey Ducks coach Joel Quenneville wouldn’t elaborate before the team left for Edmonton on Sunday.

“I think it’s going to be a team effort because they play so much,” Quenneville said. “You get icings, so everybody’s going to get exposure to them. Pick your poison. But be excited about the opportunity to play against them.”

In the teams’ three meetings during the regular season, the Oilers were at home twice and had the “last change,” so they could wait until the Ducks make their substitutions first and respond by putting who they want on the ice. Draisaitl was dealing with his lower-body injury on March 28 and was not available for the third matchup.

In that 4-2 win, Edmonton took advantage as McDavid scored against Anaheim’s fourth line. Carlsson largely was shielded from those matchups with him, as Ryan Poehling and Mikael Granlund often took those shifts. But in a 6-5 win over the Oilers in Anaheim on Feb. 25, Quenneville often put Carlsson out when McDavid hit the ice in a game-changing third-period rally. Carlsson fueled the comeback with a goal and the primary assist on Cutter Gauthier’s late winner — after Draisaitl replaced McDavid.

In this series, Quenneville will match wits with Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch when it comes to whether he’ll have Carlsson jump on against either McDavid or Draisaitl, or task others primarily with that defensive duty. And in the offensive end, Quenneville might look to seize opportunities where he can get his young star away from either star.

But Carlsson will play a lot in every game, and there will be times when he contends with either No. 97 or No. 29.

“You have to have a little more respect for Connor’s speed, obviously,” Carlsson said. “Everybody knows you have to be a little bit more on top of him early. Leon, you just have to make sure he can’t find those passing lanes he’s so good at. It’s different for sure.”

That midseason win in Anaheim saw Carlsson record three points and earn the evening’s first star. It was the kind of performance the Ducks will need over the series to counter the Oilers’ often-unstoppable duo.

In this, his third season, Carlsson established new statistical highs across the board. He finished second to Gauthier on the Ducks with 29 goals and 67 points. His 38 assists were tied with Troy Terry for second behind defenseman Jackson LaCombe. And his 0.96 points per game led Anaheim.

But he’s never been in a playoff game. Mikael Granlund has. Monday will be Granlund’s 78th playoff game, including 18 last season with the Dallas Stars on their run to the Western Conference final — where they lost to the Oilers.

But while Carlsson is a beginner, Granlund sees a highly skilled 6-foot-3, 208-pound pivot and concludes that Carlsson is “such a good player, anything’s possible” for him.

“I think he’s going to become one of the best players in the league,” Granlund said. “He already is one of the best ones, in my opinion. I don’t know if there’s a ceiling for him. He keeps getting better and working hard. Just enjoying the game of hockey. That’s all I can tell. He’s such a good player and such a good human being.”

Carlsson missed out on another big moment this year. He was slated to play for Sweden in the Olympics. And on a roster that included proven centers such as Mika Zibanejad, Elias Pettersson, Joel Eriksson Ek and Elias Lindholm, there was strong speculation that No. 1 center duties would have been in Carlsson’s hands.

“Really cool,” Carlsson said, looking back. “There’s been so many great centermen in the history of Sweden too. Would have been an honor for sure.”

It got denied. While he finished a Jan. 10 game at Buffalo with a goal and assist, Carlsson hadn’t felt right for a few weeks. The pain in his left thigh that he really started feeling just before the Christmas holiday was not alleviating over time. He missed a Dec. 22 home game against Seattle with the hope that a few days off the ice would do the trick. But the more he played afterward, the pain only worsened.

Team doctors diagnosed a Morel-Lavallée lesion, a rare condition resulting from shearing trauma and collection of fluid in the space between deep fatty tissue and superficial fascia — the loose connective tissue layer beneath the skin. Surgery sidelined him for the remaining 11 Anaheim games before the Olympic break. And by then, Sweden officials concluded that he couldn’t join the roster in Milan.

Carlsson said he knew he hurt his thigh badly when he initially fell on it during a game. The next night, he couldn’t move it, but the pain wasn’t so severe that he couldn’t continue playing. But it would swell up and, as he recalled, “Any touch on it, it hurt pretty bad.”

Looking back, he called it a weird experience. The name of the lesion only added to that.

“I’ve never heard that word before,” Carlsson said. “It was just a weird word. I wouldn’t say I was shocked though really. It was swollen for like a long time, like something was wrong. I just didn’t know what it was.”

Now, three months later, Carlsson said he continues to feel good and have the burst to power through the zones. It is very apparent each time he takes the puck from his own end of the ice and gallops through the neutral zone with powerful strides. And his production returned following the surgery. From that Feb. 25 game against Edmonton on, Carlsson finished with 11 goals and 23 points in his final 26 games.

Vegas Golden Knights defenseman Rasmus Andersson played with Carlsson for Sweden in the best-on-best 4 Nations Face-Off in the spring of 2025 and in last year’s world championships. Andersson is convinced that his countryman can become one of the NHL’s best, and even Sweden’s next great player.

“He’s one of those centermen that carries the puck through the neutral zone, and those are always the toughest centermen to play against,” Andersson said. “I have no doubt that he’s Sweden’s next superstar. Yeah. I have no problem saying it.

“He’s a great kid. He’s a really good player. He’s a big boy, and he skates well. It feels like he sees the game really well, too. I think the sky’s the limit for him as well.”

Now the great challenge, as Carlsson termed it, is at his door. And there will be a large audience watching how he does.

“It’s a great experience and (the Olympics) could have been a great experience for him also,” Quenneville said. “But I thought that Leo, at the beginning of the season really, really showed that he’s looking to go to that next level. And I thought down the stretch here, Leo’s been very good for us. Game in, game out, we’re noticing his speed. His possession time. Wanting the puck. And he’s been a factor in our team game.

“I’m looking forward to see him.”

A great playoff series can form one’s reputation. Carlsson isn’t fazed. He’s relaxed. Ready.

“Looking forward to it a lot,” he said.