{"id":635224,"date":"2026-04-29T00:18:14","date_gmt":"2026-04-29T00:18:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/635224\/"},"modified":"2026-04-29T00:18:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T00:18:14","slug":"notebook-with-mcdavids-status-in-doubt-ailing-oilers-aim-to-push-past-ducks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/635224\/","title":{"rendered":"Notebook: With McDavid’s status in doubt, ailing Oilers aim to push past Ducks"},"content":{"rendered":"

McDavid missed morning skate along with third-line centre Jason Dickinson \u2014 also a game-time decision \u2014 on the same day the Oilers captain was named as a finalist for the Ted Lindsay Award. He was joined by Nikita Kucherov and Macklin Celebrini as nominees to be named the \u201cmost outstanding player in the NHL,\u201d as voted by fellow members of the NHLPA.<\/p>\n

\u201cLeast surprising news I\u2019ve heard this morning,\u201d quipped Leon Draisaitl.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not about individual awards in Edmonton, of course. The Oilers’ season is on the line in Game 5 against Anaheim Tuesday night (Sportsnet, Sportsnet+, 10 p.m. ET \/ 8 p.m. MT), and their top centreman and best player is too injured to take part in a morning skate. McDavid\u2019s blades won\u2019t touch the ice between the end of Game 4 and warmups before Game 5.<\/p>\n

Dickinson, Edmonton\u2019s third-line centre, has missed half the series and limped through the other half. Draisaitl is nursing a bad knee and the fourth-line centre Adam Henrique is lost for the series.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe talked about it when we lost Leon at the end of the season,\u201d said head coach Kris Knoblauch. \u201cWe were missing an incredible player and we’re not the same team without him, and everyone needed to step up. I thought for the most part, everyone did.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, we have some guys who are banged up, and they’re continuing to play and doing the best that they can do. But ultimately, everybody’s got to step up a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

A telltale sign in this series has been the Oilers\u2019 inability to sustain their game. They\u2019ve held a lead in every game but can\u2019t hold on to it.<\/p>\n

Credit the Ducks, one of the best comeback teams in NHL history this season. But also, we\u2019re not sure that some of Edmonton\u2019s better players \u2014 including winger Zach Hyman \u2014 are healthy enough for a full 60-minute effort.<\/p>\n

NHL players will never cop to injuries mid-series. Besides, no one cares who was hurt \u2014 only who won.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s not ideal right now, at the moment,\u201d admitted Draisaitl. \u201cBut we\u2019ve got to find a way to grind through it, and we\u2019ve got to find a way to stick through it. We’ll look to do that tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

After starting Tristan Jarry in Game 4, Knoblauch is coming back with Connor Ingram<\/a> Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Normally, Jarry\u2019s performance in Game 4 would have been enough to earn him another start. But when you are in the position that Edmonton is \u2014 lives on the line against the young, impressive Ducks \u2014 you tend to go with the guy that brought you here.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last few weeks or months, Ingram has been our starter. He’s been our guy,\u201d Knoblauch said. \u201cAnd now that our season is on the line, we felt we would go with our guy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ingram has been merely OK through these playoffs \u2014\u00a0excellent in Game 1, less so in Game 2 and he allowed six goals in Game 3. The saves this Oilers team will require are on the penalty kill, the one area where the Ducks have tilted this series.<\/p>\n

Anaheim\u2019s power play is churning along at 50 per cent, ranked first in the playoffs. Edmonton\u2019s PK is, of course, dead last at 50 per cent. That\u2019s a series-decider right there.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur penalty kill, we’ve been giving up goals, every game,\u201d said defenceman Connor Murphy. \u201cThings are going to happen where we get calls against us, and we got to weather that and be able to turn it into momentum.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Oilers mixed up their defensive pairings at practice, but we predict they\u2019ll be back to normal come game time. And with Dickinson and McDavid not skating, it\u2019s hard to tell who plays where. Assuming they both play, here\u2019s our best guess:<\/p>\n

Savoie-McDavid-Hyman
Podkolzin-Draisaitl-Kapanen
RNH-Dickinson-Roslovic
Dach-Lazar-Frederic<\/p>\n

Ekholm-Bouchard
Nurse-Murphy
Walman-Emberson<\/p>\n

As for Anaheim, we foresee no changes in their lineup:<\/p>\n

Kreider-Carlsson-Terry
Killorn-Granlund-Sennecke
McTavish-Poehling-Gauthier
Viel-Washe-Moore<\/p>\n

LaCombe-Trouba
Mintyukov-Carlson
Hinds-Helleson<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re watching the Ducks at length for the first time this season, the big revelation is defenceman Jackson LaCombe<\/a>. Out west, we\u2019ve been watching him for a while now, the 25-year-old stud No. 1 defenceman on a wildly entertaining Anaheim club.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s playing 24:15 per game, tops on the Ducks, and he looks like he could handle more.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe’s been really good in the series, as far as his movement, his speed of the attack, his possession. He just seems like he’s playing his best hockey this season,\u201d said head coach Joel Quenneville. \u201cHe doesn’t really look like he gets tired.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe talked about No. 2 (Duncan Keith) that we used to have in Chicago, trying to take big minutes. I mean, both almost look like there’s more there.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the inexperienced Ducks win playoff games \u2014 and individual shifts against names like McDavid and Draisaitl \u2014 their belief is shooting through the roof.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt gives us more confidence each game,\u201d LaCombe said. \u201cWe’re just building our game, just improving more each day, and it’s important for us. We know it’s going to be a huge challenge (Tuesday night), and it’s only going to get harder.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"McDavid missed morning skate along with third-line centre Jason Dickinson \u2014 also a game-time decision \u2014 on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":635225,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194294],"tags":[49,48,23752],"class_list":["post-635224","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\/635224","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=635224"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/635224\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/635225"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=635224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=635224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=635224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}