Another line shakeup for the Oilers hours before Game 1

Once the Edmonton Oilers reached the Western Conference Final by beating the Vegas Golden Knights in six games in Round 2, it was unfortunately announced that they have dealing with injured players that will not be ready for the start of the Western final series.

Goalie Calvin Pickard is currently out with an undisclosed injury and will not be ready for the beginning of the series. Same goes for defenseman Mattias Ekholm who is expected to miss Game 1 and Game 2 of the series with an undisputed, but is likely for Game 3.

However on Wednesday morning at the skate, the Oilers were forced to make another change and work on different line combinations seeing that now forward Connor Brown is a game-time decision. Per Daniel Nugent-Bowman:

“Kris Knoblauch called Connor Brown a game-time decision. Brown was at the rink this morning but didn’t skate and didn’t take part in full practices on Saturday or Monday heading into the series.”

As team insider Ryan Rishaug points out, Viktor Arvidsson was slotted in Brown’s spot on a line with Evander Kane and Adam Henrique.

The rest of lines and pairs are the same.

These are Oilers lines and pairings at morning skate pre Game 1 in Dallas:

RNH-McDavid-Hyman
Podkolzin-Draisaitl-Kapanen
Kane-Henrique-Arvidsson
Frederic-Janmark-Perry

Kulak-Bouchard
Nurse-Stecher
Walman-Klingberg
Ekholm-Emberson

Skinner
Rodrigue