Oilers at Blues preview

OILERS (32-33-7) at BLUES (37-27-8)
8 p.m. ET; SN1, SNE, SNO, SNP, FS-MW, NHL.TV

Tarasenko missed five games with an upper-body injury.
The Blues, who are two points ahead of the Dallas Stars for third place in the Central Division, were 1-2-2 without Tarasenko.
The Oilers, who complete a three-game road trip, are seven points behind the Arizona Coyotes for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference.
Goalie Jordan Binnington will start for the Blues. He's 13-3-0 with a 1.69 goals-against average, .934 save percentage and four shutouts in his past 16 starts.
The Oilers will start goalie Mikko Koskinen for the fifth straight game and 17th in the past 18.

Players to watch

Oilers center Connor McDavid has 23 points (five goals, 18 assists) in a personal 12-game point streak, including 18 points (three goals, 15 assists) in an NHL season-long eight-game multi-point streak.
Blues forward David Perron has 18 points (seven goals, 11 assists) in a personal NHL career high 15-game point streak, including two points (one goal, one assist) in two games since returning from a 24-game injury absence.

They said it

"He's our guy. He's the guy we've hung our hat on. He's had a couple of really good outings, he's had a tough outing. He's had a couple of those tough outings and he's rebounded." -- Oilers coach Ken Hitchcock on goalie Mikko Koskinen
"We have some key games coming down the stretch here and if we can get healthy, it's good. It obviously helps our team dramatically being healthy and having these guys back in our lineup." -- Blues center Ryan O'Reilly

Oilers projected lineup

Leon Draisaitl -- Connor McDavid -- Zack Kassian
Jujhar Khaira -- Ryan Nugent-Hopkins -- Sam Gagner
Joseph Gambardella -- Colby Cave -- Alex Chiasson
Milan Lucic -- Kyle Brodziak -- Ty Rattie
Oscar Klefbom -- Adam Larsson
Darnell Nurse -- Kris Russell
Andrej Sekera -- Matt Benning
Mikko Koskinen
Anthony Stolarz
Scratched: Josh Currie, Alexander Petrovic, Kevin Gravel, Brad Malone, Tobias Rieder
Injured: Jesse Puljujarvi (lower body)

Blues projected lineup

Brayden Schenn -- Ryan O'Reilly -- Vladimir Tarasenko
Pat Maroon -- Tyler Bozak -- Robert Thomas
Jaden Schwartz -- Oskar Sundqvist -- David Perron
Alexander Steen -- Ivan Barbashev -- Zach Sanford
Vince Dunn -- Alex Pietrangelo
Jay Bouwmeester -- Colton Parayko
Michael Del Zotto -- Robert Bortuzzo
Jordan Binnington
Jake Allen
Scratched: Robby Fabbri, Mackenzie MacEachern
Injured: Carl Gunnarsson (upper body), Joel Edmundson (lower body), Sammy Blais (lower body)

Status report

Rieder will be a healthy scratch for the first time in 23 games and second time in 42 games. ... Blues coach Craig Berube said Edmundson has skated the past two days and is getting closer. ... Gunnarsson took part in the morning skate. He has not played since Feb. 5.

Stat pack

Draisaitl has 25 points (11 goals, 14 assists) in his past 17 games and 35 points (19 goals, 16 assists) in his past 24.