The Edmonton Oilers will be without one of their defense's Stanley Cup playoff contributors when they open the 2017-18 season, as general manager Peter Chiarelli announced Tuesday that blueliner Andrej Sekera will miss between six and nine months of action due to a torn ACL.
Sekera, 30, went down early in Game 5 of the Oilers' second-round matchup with the Anaheim Ducks in the Western Conference playoffs, leaving the postseason having scored three points for Edmonton after a 35-point regular season.
And with a six-to-nine-month rehabilitation time frame, he is anticipated to be sidelined well into or beyond the first month of the Oilers' 2017-18 campaign.
Losing Sekera gives Edmonton a bit of salary cap relief -- in an unfortunate manner, no less -- and perhaps escalates Griffin Reinhart's role for the Oilers moving forward. But it also strips them of one of their better defensemen and, in some sense, puts more pressure on Chiarelli and the Oilers to ensure Kris Russell returns.
