Zach Hyman, still a few weeks away from returning after his major wrist surgery, with all the inserted plates and screws, isn’t the only Edmonton Oilers winger who hasn’t played a game yet, with the NHL season sliding into November.
We haven’t seen their best playoff penalty-killer Mattias Janmark, either.
“Good to be back in the mix. I haven’t practised with the full team yet but I hope to play next weekend. That said, it’s not my decision because we have a lot of bodies here,” said Janmark, who took part in the morning skate for Saturday’s home game against Chicago, the 13th game he’s missed, coinciding with his jersey number.
The Oilers are going to get into a numbers crunch soon. They have seven healthy defencemen and 13 forwards, with Curtis Lazar and Noah Philp in and out except when they go 11-7. Hyman is on long-term injury, winger Kasperi Kapanen (knee) is out until December and defenceman Alec Regula (concussion issues) is close to being ready.
But Janmark, who came to camp with a lingering medical problem, suspected lower body, will play somewhere when healthy. He’s one of coach Kris Knoblauch’s most trusted bottom-six players. He’ll probably be on the fourth line, but he usually shows up late in games if the coach wants a defensive forward in the top six, too, when protecting a lead. He will get lots of penalty-kill minutes, too.
Janmark, who has this season and next at $1.45 million is a better playoff forward than regular season, and that’s a good thing. You would rather that than a guy who disappears in May and June. Just ask Glen Sather, who often gritted his teeth on Esa Tikkanen during regular-season but loved him in the playoffs.
Janmark has scored six goals in 151 regular-season games over the past two years and has seven goals in 47 playoff games. He scored the Oilers only goal in Game 7 of the final in Florida in 2024, on a nifty breakaway shot.
“There’s no answer to it. If I knew why, I would change,” he said.
His style doesn’t translate from October to April, like post-season. “In regular-season I try to play an honest game, take what I’m given offensively. Playoffs just suits my game better. I’m more comfortable. Things come easier for me, You don’t worry about points even if you go 10 games without one. It can be a blocked shot, a penalty kill, You’re contributing that way,” he said.
“If you go 10 games without a point or a goal in regular season, you feel people are looking at you. Yeah, I’d like to score more but if I have two in regular-season and four in the playoffs I would take that more,” said Janmark, who turns 33 in December and has 637 league games and 113 in the playoffs, where he has tallied 15 goals and 37 points.
He won’t have his usual penalty-kill partner in crime, Connor Brown, now in New Jersey, but he’s also played with Nugent-Hopkins in the past. “When you have a regular guy (like Brown), you can read off each other. We can both skate and for sure we were ready for loose pucks. Maybe with a new guy though you have to be sharper and we’ve also got different players on the kill this year,” he said.
He thought he would be ready for Oct. 8 or even half a dozen games in, but the injury means he could miss 15 games or more, which is about 20 per cent of the schedule.
“It was something I’ve been dealing with for a long time. I thought I’d be fine but it turned out to be worse than we thought. The hope was to play on the Eastern trip but I guess this is longer on the timeline,” he said.
Is he worried about catching a moving train?
“Not really. If it happened five or six years ago maybe I would be more frustrated but being in the league a long time, you learn how to deal with things like this. I can’t expect to come back and be cruising right away but it’s easier to have this at the start of the year rather than when you get hurt in season and have to start over,” said Janmark, who hurt his shoulder three years ago just before the late October outdoor game at Commonwealth against Calgary and missed 10 games.
This ‘n that: Adam Henrique, the first Edmonton player to ever get a silver stick for his 1000th game in an Oilers jersey, was very appreciative of the how the team feted him in the pre-game ceremony last Thursday before the Ranger game. “I can’t get over how heavy the stick is,” said Henrique, who doesn’t have it in a place of honour yet. “No, it’s sitting on the kitchen table.” … Wayne Gretzky’s 1,000th NHL game was with Los Angeles, as was Jari Kurri’s. Mark Messier’s 1000th game was with the Rangers, Paul Coffey with Detroit, Glenn Anderson with Toronto … Hawks captain Nick Foligno, a doppelganger for Philadelphia Eagles head coach Nick Siriani, dressed up as the NFL coach for Chicago’s Halloween party and Siriani later returned the favour for the Eagles party. Foligno’s actual birthday is Oct. 31. The two have never met but it was a good gag … The Oilers officially hired Andy Slaggert after more than three decades as a coach with Notre Dame University. He’ll be director of North American recruiting. He recruited more than 70 players who became NHL draft picks. Slaggert’s son Landon happens to be in town with the Blackhawks … With Saturday’s game against the Hawks, Nugent-Hopkins tied Ryan Smyth (971) for No. 2 in Oilers games. Kevin Lowe is No. 1 at 1,037 but his 1000th NHL game came with the New York Rangers … Hyman’s Brantford Bulldogs OHL junior team is rated No. 1 in the country with high hopes of making it to the 2026 Memorial Cup in Kelowna. They just traded nine draft picks and three players to Oshawa to get Maple Leafs 2024 first-round-pick defenceman Ben Danford and fellow defenceman Zack Sandhu.