Leon Draisaitl gets 100% honest about playing through 'pain' after injury absence

Edmonton Oilers center Leon Draisaitl spoke to reporters about his injury after Saturday's team’s morning skate. Draisaitl, one of the Oilers’s most consistent performers this season, has been out with an injury he sustained against the Utah Hockey Club on Mar. 18. Edmonton's woes were compounded by an injury to team captain Connor McDavid.

Per informed sources, Draisaitl’s absence from the bench was a team decision to have him 100 percent fit for the playoffs. One source said the center would likely play through if similarly hurt in the playoffs. Leon Draisaitl also said something similar during the media session.

"I'll play through anything if it's at the right time,” Draisaitl said. “You know, it has happened, unfortunately, in the last two playoff runs for us. But I think this is not the time where you tinker with things like that, looking at the big picture.

"So there's always a little bit of pain involved in anything. You can go throughout the room and find everybody with something, so but I'm certainly smart about it."

The Oilers are currently third in the Pacific Division with 87 points from 72 games. Before this run of three games, the team had only played two games without Draisaitl and McDavid in the lineup since the 2015-16 season.

The two stars’s absence has been felt this week. Edmonton edged the Seattle Kraken 5-4 on Mar. 22 before losing 4-3 to the Dallas Stars on Wednesday. This was followed by a resounding 6-1 loss against the Kraken in a reverse fixture on Thursday.

Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch had called on the rest of the roster to step up and fill the void left by Draisaitl and McDavid but has seen mixed results.

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Knoblauch says Leon Draisaitl will return before Connor McDavid.

On Thursday, Knoblauch updated the two-star players's injuries, saying Leon Draisaitl would return sooner than Connor McDavid.

“Leon will be back sooner than Connor. We’re looking at about a week, maybe shorter for Leon, and Connor will be longer than that,” Knoblauch said via yardbarker.com.

Draisaitl might be named to the bench for Saturday’s game against the Calgary Flames. The German forward has scored 49 goals this season and tops the goals-scoring chart in the NHL. He had scored 27 points in 18 consecutive games before the streak was halted in the game against Utah. Though the Oilers won 7-1 on the night, Draisaitl failed to get a point.