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<\/p>\nDraisaitl sat out the last 14 games of the regular season with a knee injury sustained March 15 when he was checked by Nashville\u2019s Ozzy Weisblatt. <\/p>\n
\t<\/p>\n
Draisaitl rejoined his teammates on the ice last Monday and skated with them a fifth time Sunday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a lot of lonely times when you\u2019re hurt, the guys are on the road, you\u2019re kind of grinding by yourself,\u201d he said Sunday. \u201cI\u2019m happy where it\u2019s at right now.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel good. We\u2019ll see how it feels tomorrow. We\u2019ll make a call from there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Draisaitl had 35 goals and 62 assists in 65 games when he was injured. He was denied the chance at a possible fifth career 50-goal, 100-point season.<\/p>\n
The German forward has compiled 141 points in 96 career playoff games. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to take a little bit of time, but I\u2019m going to find my ways to contribute and try to get to my best as quick as I can,\u201d Draisaitl said.<\/p>\n
A one-two punch of captain Connor McDavid and Draisaitl would give the seasoned Oilers a leg up in Game 1 against the Ducks returning to the post-season after a seven-year absence.<\/p>\n
Edmonton reached the Stanley Cup final the last two years and lost both times to the Florida Panthers.<\/p>\n
In 14 playoff series over the last six years, Edmonton\u2019s record in series-openers was 4-10.<\/p>\n
Draisaitl, 30, has played through post-season pain before. Despite a high-ankle sprain in Game 6 of the 2022 opening round against Los Angeles, he recorded two goals and 22 assists in his next 10 games before the Oilers were ousted in the conference final by Colorado.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has an ability to raise his game to a whole other level,\u201d McDavid said Sunday. \u201cYou see that time and time again in the playoffs, this guy who battled through anything. Really impressive.\u201d<\/p>\n
Draisaitl credited Edmonton\u2019s strength and conditioning coach Chad Drummond and assistant athletic therapist Chris Davie for shepherding him through his most recent injury.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s always a fine line of hurting yourself or your future or the team to grinding through something that you\u2019ve got to find different ways to contribute and help your team,\u201d Draisaitl said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know it\u2019s going to take me a couple games to really be myself and that\u2019s OK. It\u2019s just the best time of the year. There\u2019s nothing like it. The atmosphere, the intensity of it, the meaning of it all, the adrenalin takes a lot of pain away, so just enjoy this time of year.\u201d<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 19, 2026.<\/p>\n
Donna Spencer, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Draisaitl sat out the last 14 games of the regular season with a knee injury sustained March 15…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":615577,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194294],"tags":[49,48,23752],"class_list":["post-615576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-edmonton","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-edmonton"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=615576"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615576\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/615577"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=615576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=615576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=615576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}