Good morning, good afternoon, good evening everyone. Welcome to the Injury Ward. My name is Logan Clarkson and every Wednesday I will be chauffeuring you through injury news and updates from around the NHL. I'll do my best to offer useful analysis and opinion as it relates to fantasy throughout. As always I’d like to thank every single one of you for reading. Now, on to the bad (and some good) news.

Connor McDavid / EDM – Mcdavid (lower body) took a shot to the ribs as he skated by Josh Morrissey when the Oilers met the Jets in Edmonton on March 20th. It has kept him out since, with rumblings of a groin issue and he is set to miss all three games this week. Look what they did to my boy! In all seriousness if there are two guys in the league that need the rest, it’s him and Leon. It's getting harder and harder to carry the load for this team. With such a sluggish and aging bottom-six retained, the Oilers were slightly hamstrung by offer sheets for Dylan Holloway and Phillip Broberg. In true Oilers fashion, they could not navigate the cap to sign either one even though Dylan Holloway cost **checks notes** 2.29 million per year for two years, and currently sits with 60 points in 74 games this season. How could you have seen this Holloway breakout coming? Probably just by watching your own team’s playoff run from last season. Oh, by the way, Stan Bowman doubled down on the moves and said "we wouldn't have been able to field a team". Another management group with cap-creativity-allergies in Edmonton. The rest of the league rejoices.

Leon Draisaitl / EDM – Draisaitl (undisclosed) is also set to miss the Oilers next 3 games on the schedule this week. Draisaitl, with 49 goals in 60 games had a chance to hit 60 goals and 60 assists for the first time by any player ever in the NHL. Probably unlikely now. He has shot 21.4% to get there, and the funny thing about it is, that would not even be the highest mark for 82 games in his career. 21.6% is what he clocked in at for 2018-19. Expect Leon to be back within a week or two and to continue to be as dominant. It's been nearly a decade since the decade of darkness for Oilers fans and it's kind of funny to me how you can forget the hard times while sitting on a pile of riches. I will never forget and it’s headed back sooner than needed with the current and consistent rate of mutiny for good players. At least it seems like Evan Bouchard is close to a long-term contract after having team aligned media put the full court press on how awful he is all season, they are starting to write positively. A true indication he is close to signing. **writer ducks to avoid artillery**. 

Charlie McAvoy / BOS – McAvoy (shoulder) returned to practice with the Bruins on Tuesday. He has had an underwhelming season by any standards including his own. The Bruins traded team captain and long-time fan favorite Brad Marchand to Florida at the deadline and have gone 2-0 since with a depleted roster. Who knew that trading some of your best players = success, maybe the Oilers were actually on to something not matching those offer sheets.

Andrei Svechnikov / CAR – Svechnikov (upper body) remained sidelined Tuesday versus the Predators, but is likely to return for Friday's game. He has missed a total of seven games in this stint on the injured list.

Brad Marchand / FLA – Marchand (undisclosed) will be back soon and the team is hoping it will be as early as Friday. Marchand is going to be very interesting to watch in a Panthers jersey alongside reigning Cup champions and many talented players. 

Matthew Tkachuk / FLA – Tkachuk (groin) is still slated to miss the rest of the regular season.

Kirill Kaprizov / MIN – Kaprizov (lower body) has suffered nearly the same fate as Tkachuk and is still going to miss most of the rest of the regular season. The team noted it’s possible he's back for the last two or three games before the playoffs. If he does miss the remaining games, then 52 points in 37 games played is where he will leave the stat line for the regular season. It is painful to watch such a dynamic player fall to injury and have the team they were pushing up the hill come right back down with them. It has been bleak without him, not to mention the Wild were without nearly any NHL defenseman for the half of the season he participated in.

Roman Josi / NSH – Josi (upper body) unfortunately will also not return to his team for the rest of the regular season and with no playoffs in their horizon that's all we will see of him in 2024-25. Josi was having a little bit of a down year alongside his team's dismal performance all season. A down year for him is good for 38 points in 53 games as a defenseman. Not too shabby.

Tomas Hertl / VGK – Hertl (shoulder) has been ruled out of the next three games for Las Vegas. Hertl was one of my favorite late round picks this year (I had a lot of them). He has provided consistent value in regular and especially bangers leagues for years. He flies a bit under the radar because he doesn't put up any eye-catching numbers, just slowly rolls everything to a roughly 50th overall ranking in my leagues while only skating for 17 minutes a night. Check him out going into drafts next year for some found value.

Elias Pettersson / VAN – Petterson (undisclosed) returned to Vancouver and will miss the remainder of the team’s road trip this week, Mike Morreale of NHL.com reported Monday. This after the once again main man in Vancouver saw his abuser (allegedly) finally traded away to the Rangers. Elias had three goals and three assists in a six-game point streak leading into the injury. 

Gabriel Vilardi / WPG – Vilardi (upper body) didn’t participate in Monday’s practice and is week-to-week, Ken Wiebe of The Winnipeg Free Press reports. Gabriel has had a career year falling under the found money category in drafts and has been good for 61 points in 71 games for the Jets. A rising tide lifts all boats… ships… Jets, or something like that. It's interesting to me what the Jets have done this season with seemingly no real superstar skaters, just a strong ability throughout the lineup, and I guess having a literal superhero in goal doesn't hurt.

Josh Norris / BUF – Norris (undisclosed) has said he is day-to-day and plans to return before the end of the regular season, Paul Hamilton of WGR Sports Radio 550 reported on Tuesday.

Cole Sillinger / CLB – Sillinger (shoulder) has been medically cleared and could return to action against the Canucks on Friday, Aaron Portzline of The Athletic reports Wednesday. 

Thanks again for reading, and please give me a follow, you can find me here on Twitter/X @LOGoalz for any questions, concerns, or abuse you may want to shower me with, but be gentle this week as its confirmed I have fractured 4 ribs from trying to play hockey myself for 10 minutes, classic media guy. Have a great week people!