BLOG: Draisaitl working hard to be ready for start of playoffs

EDMONTON, AB – Leon Draisaitl is giving it his best shot to make it back for the start of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, but he knows this isn’t an injury he wants to rush back from.

"There are certain things that you can play through, and others where you have to think about your future and the team's future a little bit," Draisaitl said on Monday. "So I think our medical staff and I know how to handle these situations, and we know when it's good to go and when it's not.

"We'll take it one game, one day at a time, and hopefully it works out."

The German spoke for the first time on Monday since being injured on April 15 against the Nashville Predators about trying to be ready in time for Edmonton’s first-round series, with his status still in question after the Oilers already locked in their spot.

Draisaitl resumed skating last week when the team left on its last regular-season road trip and has been going through the checklist to hopefully be fit and healthy for Game 1, likely to come either this Saturday or Sunday against an undetermined opponent.

“I don't know, we'll see,” Draisaitl said about his availability for the start of the playoffs. “Obviously, there are steps that I have to follow, and there are certain things that I have to be able to do. I'm not there yet, so we'll see how that goes by the end of the week or whenever Game 1 is.”

After absorbing an awkward check near the benches from Nashville’s Ozzy Wiesblatt, Draisaitl went straight to the dressing room before trying it out again a few minutes later, but wouldn’t be able to finish the game because of a lower-body injury that has resulted in him missing the last 12 games and the remainder of the regular season.

"I knew that there was something wrong right away," he said. "I'm not necessarily a player that goes off like that with every little pinch I feel, so I felt that this was something a little bit more serious."

For someone who's developed a reputation for playing through the pain from his inspired 2022 playoff run, where he recorded 32 points (seven goals) over 16 games while battling a high-ankle sprain, the German superstar is well tuned to know when he can or can't play through an injury, and this wasn't something he was about to make any worse.

That cautious approach has allowed Draisaitl to get the rest, recovery and rehab needed to put him on the best course to be ready for Game 1 of the playoffs, but it might end up coming later in Round 1.

"I think nobody knows their bodies better than the athletes themselves," he said. "I know my body better than anyone in the world, and I know when I'm ready to go and when I'm forcing it. I'm highly aware of that, and this isn't an injury that you force anything with.

"I'm gonna see how I feel by the end of the week, and hopefully it feels great and I'm an option. Maybe it's a couple of games later, but we'll see."

Head Coach Kris Knoblauch said it's too soon to confirm Draisaitl's availability for Game 1 of the postseason, given what he's played through in the past, but they can be reassured that, when he is given the green light, he'll be more than ready to go.

"I think it'd be premature to say that he'd be healthy to play ready today, so he's got a process to go through," Knoblauch said. Hopefully, with the skates and the rehab treatments that he's getting, he'll be ready for us.

"Ideally, it'd be Game 1. If it's Game 3 or 4, then so be it.  We're going to have to adjust.  But we know Leon will play through a lot of pain, and he wants to play in the Stanley Cup Playoffs more than anything. So there's never any doubt about his will, and we'd be very fortunate to have him in game one, but we'll have to wait and find out."