Flyers’ Travis Konecny, Nick Seeler Return From Injury
Two veteran Philadelphia Flyers players returned from injury-related absences for the team’s game tonight against the Rangers: winger Travis Konecny and defenseman Nick Seeler.
Konecny is the more notable name of the pair, as he has led the Flyers in scoring each season for the last half-decade.
The 28-year-old has 57 points in 58 games this season, and holds a six-point lead over teammate Trevor Zegras for the scoring lead.
Last week, it was announced that Konecny would be sidelined on a day-to-day basis as he dealt with an upper-body injury. He missed the team’s victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs on March 2, as well as their following two contests.
With his return tonight, his injury absence is capped at three games, a stretch in which the Flyers went 2-1-0.
With the Flyers clinging to slim playoff hopes at this stage of the season (their 29-22-11 record puts them seven points behind the Boston Bruins for the Eastern Conference’s final playoff spot, with a game in hand), getting Konecny back now gives the team a boost to its competitive chances.
Were the Flyers somehow in the Western Conference, they would actually be in playoff position, but their geographic position puts their playoff hopes in a precarious spot. For them to build any momentum to go on a run and challenge for a playoff spot for the rest of the season, they’ll need Konecny healthy and playing at his best.
The other injured Flyer to be returning, Seeler, isn’t quite as important to the team as Konecny, but that’s not to say he doesn’t play a useful role in head coach Rick Tocchet’s lineup. The 32-year-old is the Flyers’ No. 5 defenseman in terms of ice time, averaging 18:21 per game.
He’s a regular penalty killer, averaging over two minutes of ice time per game short-handed. He also adds imposing size and a physical edge to a Flyers defense staffed with other players (outside of veteran Rasmus Ristolainen) who are not known for having that kind of dimension to their game.
Seeler missed the Flyers’ last two games nursing a lower-body injury. While Seeler was sidelined, 24-year-old Emil Andrae played in Seeler’s former role on the Flyers’ third pairing, next to veteran Noah Juulsen. With Seeler back, Andrae will exit the lineup and serve as a healthy scratch.
That sort of development has larger implications for Andrae. He is a pending arbitration-eligible restricted free agent, meaning each game carries significant stakes – he’s playing to prove he deserves a spot in the Flyers’ future plans. Each game spent as a healthy scratch is a lost opportunity for Andrae to make his case for a new contract with the Flyers.
But putting the consequences of Seeler’s return for Andrae aside, it’s clear his relatively quick recovery is a positive development for the Flyers as a whole. Seeler, like Konecny, is a valuable veteran for the team, and if they are to continue to play meaningful hockey down the stretch, they’ll need to have both players healthy and productive for as long as possible.
Photos courtesy of Timothy T. Ludwig-USA TODAY Sports
Avalanche’s Gabriel Landeskog Out Week-To-Week
The Colorado Avalanche will be without a second-line winger for the short future. Captain Gabriel Landeskog has been designated as out week-to-week with a lower-body injury after taking a shot from Cale Makar to the groin per Corey Masisak of The Denver Post. Landeskog had a puck-sized dent in his athletic cup after the game, adds Masisak.
Landeskog has already missed 14 games to various injuries this season. Luckily, none of them have been connected to the knee injuries that held Landeskog out of three regular seasons, from 2022 to 2025. He made a brief return for the playoffs in 2022 and 2025 – combining for 26 points in 25 games. That momentum set Landeskog up for a major, and important, return this season. Through some bouts with injury, he has found a way to match the bill, netting 29 points in 47 games and returning to his clear-cut role as Colorado’s second-line left-wing.
Landeskog’s playmaking has helped spark veteran center Brock Nelson in his first full season with the club. Nelson has a tremendous 30 goals and 53 points in 61 games, helped along by a 21.1 shooting percentage. When he’s not playing off of Nelson, Landeskog has been deployed on Colorado’s top line, next to high-tempo scorers Nathan MacKinnon and Martin Necas. He has matched that duo’s pace and outscored opponents 15-to-three in his top-line minutes.
It is that layer of versatile scoring that Colorado will now have to replace. They’ll, luckily, find the perfect source of offense in Trade Deadline pickup Nazem Kadri. Kadri reached his career-high in scoring – 87 points – in Colorado’s Cup-winning 2021-22 season. He has spent the last four years in a clear #1 role on a middling Calgary Flames offense. The jolt of rejoining a red-hot Avalanche club could be enough to spark Kadri’s scoring once again. He will assume Landeskog’s role on the second-line wing, at least until the Avalanche’s captain is back to full health.
Colorado sits comfortably on top of the Western Conference, with seven more points and a game in hand over the second-place Dallas Stars. Even better, they have a fairly light schedule through the next few weeks, with multiple matchups against the Winnipeg Jets, Pittsburgh Penguins, and St. Louis Blues. Those games are intercut with tough tests against the Edmonton Oilers and Dallas Stars but Colorado should have plenty of runway to find a spark headed into those games. They will lean on Kadri to adjust quick and keep the offense firing, while envisioning what their lineup could look like at full health, when Landeskog and Artturi Lehkonen are in their proper spots.
Evening Notes: Larkin, Fabbro, Faksa
The Detroit Red Wings got quite the scare yesterday evening when captain Dylan Larkin exited the game prematurely from what appeared to be a non-contact injury. Fortunately, Detroit has avoided the worst-case scenario, as they announced Larkin was only expected to miss the next few days.
In Larkin’s absence, Helene St. James of the Detroit Free Press shared that the Red Wings are expected to recall a forward before tomorrow’s contest against the New Jersey Devils. Detroit already recalled forward Michael Brandsegg-Nygard earlier today while the team waits for recent acquisition David Perron to return from sports hernia surgery.
Given that the team could now use additional depth down the middle, it would make sense for Detroit to recall Sheldon Dries or Nate Danielson in Larkin’s absence. The latter has already registered 28 games with the Red Wings this season, scoring two goals and seven points with a 37.7% faceoff percentage.
Other notes from this evening:
- The Columbus Blue Jackets don’t expect to be without defenseman Dante Fabbro for much longer. According to team reporter Jeff Svoboda, the Blue Jackets are expecting Fabbro to return in the next game or two, although he didn’t play tonight. There’s not much information on what’s ailing Fabbro, but he’s missed Columbus’s last two games. He has scored four goals and nine points in 54 games this season, averaging 15:59 of ice time per game.
- Exiting the Olympics, it was believed that the Dallas Stars would have Radek Faksa back relatively soon. Regrettably, that has not been true, and there won’t be any changes in the near future. According to radio analyst Bruce LeVine, Faksa suffered a significant setback during his rehabilitation process, and the Stars aren’t expecting him back until the postseason. He will likely finish the 2025-26 regular season with two goals and 17 points in 56 contests.
Pacific Notes: Granlund, Carlson, Golden Knights, Sharks
There is a growing expectation that the Anaheim Ducks will return forward Mikael Granlund to the lineup tomorrow. According to Derek Lee of The Hockey News, Granlund was a full participant at practice this morning and centered the team’s second line.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean the Ducks will have a complete lineup. In a separate report from Lee, he indicated that recent acquisition John Carlson remains working his way back from a lower-body injury and isn’t expected to debut tomorrow.
At any rate, it’ll be a decent boost for Anaheim to get Granlund back into the lineup. He has been oft-injured this year, appearing in only 38 games, scoring 12 goals and 27 points. Still, the Ducks will need all the depth they can as they continue their playoff push.
Additional notes from the Pacific Division:
- Per Jason R. Pothier and Ken Boehlke of SinBin, General Manager Kelly McCrimmon provided a few updates on several key injuries to the Vegas Golden Knights. Regarding the forward corps, McCrimmon said the team only expects captain Mark Stone to miss the next few days. Additionally, the Golden Knights haven’t placed forward William Karlsson on season-ending long-term injured reserve, but will have to make it to the semifinals if they want to see him again this season. Lastly, McCrimmon added that netminder Carter Hart is still a few weeks away from returning.
- The San Jose Sharks retained their numerous pending unrestricted free agents through the deadline as their own rentals, rewarding the team’s performance so far. Speaking with Curtis Pashelka of Mercury News, General Manager Mike Grier said, “So it kind of felt like it was the best thing to do, in all fairness to them, to kind of keep the group together and see how the rest of the season goes.” Regardless, that didn’t stop teams from making calls, specifically regarding Mario Ferraro and John Klingberg.
Emil Martinsen Lilleberg Out Two Weeks
The Tampa Bay Lightning are again losing some of their defensive depth to injury. The Lightning announced that Emil Martinsen Lilleberg would miss the next two weeks after suffering a facial fracture at practice.
Tampa Bay didn’t specify how Lilleberg suffered the injury, but it’s likely he took an errant puck to the face at practice. It seems that this was an unfortunate accident during practice.
Although the Lightning have suffered multiple injuries on the blue line this season, the defensive corps is in much better shape than it has been for much of the campaign. Including Lilleberg, the Bolts have everyone else available except for Maxwell Crozier.
Today’s update is the second injury Lilleberg has suffered this season. Earlier this year, he missed approximately two months due to an undisclosed injury. In total, he’s skated in 35 games, scoring two goals and six points while averaging 16:56 of ice time.
Unfortunately, through no fault of his own, this season can’t be seen as anything other than a step back for Lilleberg. Last season, his first full year in the NHL, he finished with one goal and 19 points in 76 games with 114 hits. He won’t get near those totals this year, but he’s signed through next season at an incredibly affordable $800K salary, so he’ll have another opportunity to get his career back on track.
Roope Hintz To Miss Multiple Weeks
Last night, the Stars got a big boost up front when Roope Hintz returned to the lineup from an illness that had kept him out since the end of the Olympic break. Unfortunately for them, that will be his last game for a little while.
Hintz sustained a lower-body injury in the second period of their game against Colorado and ultimately had to be helped off the ice. Speaking with reporters today including D Magazine’s Robert Tiffin (Twitter link), Hintz is set to miss multiple weeks due to the injury. As he needs to be evaluated by another doctor, no firm timeline is available yet but the team is hopeful that Hintz will be able to return by the start of the playoffs next month.
Hintz has been productive as always this season, putting up 15 goals and 29 assists in 53 games while averaging over 17 minutes per night. The 29-year-old has been their number one center throughout the year while seeing time on both special teams units. On top of that, Hintz is their top full-time performer at the faceoff dot, winning over 59% of his draws. Suffice it to say, his loss will be significant, especially with the Stars in a tight battle for second place in the Central Division to try to secure home-ice advantage in the first round.
With 12 other healthy forwards on the roster, the Stars aren’t yet eligible for an emergency recall, one that wouldn’t count against their post-deadline regular recall limit of five. However, given that Hintz is going to be out for a while, it wouldn’t be surprising to see Dallas utilize one of those five recalls from AHL Texas to ensure that they have at least one extra healthy forward available over the coming weeks.
Devils Notes: Pesce, Cholowski, Gritsyuk
The New Jersey Devils will be down a usual lineup piece this weekend. Defenseman Brett Pesce will be unavailable due to a lower-body injury, head coach Sheldon Keefe told NHL.com’s Mike Morreale.
Pesce has already missed 25 games this season with extended absences in November and February. He fills a key role in the lineup when healthy, playing upwards of 22 minutes a night when New Jersey is looking for a shutdown piece. Pesce has worked to seven points and a minus-11 in 37 games this season. He ranks second on the Devils in shot blocks (80) and fourth on the defense in takeaways (16). Pesce has been knocked off course by injury in his age-31 season but his two-way reliability will still continue to command major lineup minutes when he’s back to full health.
Other notes out of New Jersey:
- The Devils have responded to Pesce’s injury by recalling depth defenseman Dennis Cholowski from the AHL. Cholowski didn’t begin his season until November, due to injury, but his year started on the NHL roster. He scored one point in 15 games through November and December while filling in during Pesce’s first extended absence of the season. Cholowski was reassigned on December 14th and has spent the entirety of the new calendar year in the AHL. He has racked up five assists in 13 games. Pesce’s injury likely won’t push Cholowski ahead of Simon Nemec and Brendan Dillon on the depth chart but it will give New Jersey one more set of hands as they approach back-to-back games.
- Away from injury news, the Devils have also begun talks of a contract extension with winger Arseny Gritsyuk, general manager Tom Fitzgerald told Devils’ team reporter Amanda Stein. Gristyuk has scored 11 goals and 26 points in 58 games as an NHL rookie this season. He is on pace for 15 goals and 37 points across a full 82-game season, which would be the seventh-highest scoring total from a Devils rookie since 2000. Gritsyuk blossomed in Russia’s KHL over the last three seasons, kicked off with 40 points in 60 games of Omsk Avangard’ 2022-23 campaign, and concluded with 44 points in 49 games with SKA St. Petersburg last year. He has adjusted seamlessly into an NHL top-nine role in the season since. That should be enough to earn Gritsyuk a contract with term as he looks to sign the first deal after his entry-level contract. He is set to become a restricted free agent with arbitration rights this summer.
Golden Knights Place Mark Stone On IR
3/5/26: The Golden Knights have placed Stone on IR, per Danny Webster of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Assuming the placement is retroactive to March 1, when he suffered his injury, Stone’s IR placement will keep him sidelined until at least Sunday. The move opens a roster spot for the team’s reported acquisition of Nic Dowd, in a trade that has still not yet been officially announced.
3/2/26: The Vegas Golden Knights will have a major hole to fill in the short-term. Top winger Mark Stone is out day-to-day with an upper-body injury sustained in Vegas’ Sunday loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins, head coach Bruce Cassidy told reporters including Mike Harrington of Buffalo News. Stone’s injury came late in the first period, after a nudge from Penguins defenseman Kris Letang. He will be questionable for Vegas’ road game versus the Buffalo Sabres on Tuesday.
Stone reached the end of the 2024-25 season in good health, dsepite mid-season injuries, but has otherwise built a tendency for missing games in the second-half of the season. Sunday’s game against Pittsburgh marked just the second time in the last four seasons that Stone has played a game in March. Routine injuries have held him out of 144 games between the start of the 2019-20 season and the end of 2024-25. He has missed an additional 17 games already this season.
The routine absences are routinely a major blow to the Vegas offense. Stone is a pillar of the lineup when healthy. He ranks second on the Golden Knights in scoring this season, with 21 goals and 60 points in only 43 games. That is a 114-point scoring pace over a full 82-game season, by far the highest on the Golden Knights. Stone has averaged 52 games, and 53 points, per season dating back to his first full season with the Golden Knights.
Vegas will face a tough test in finding who should replace Stone in the lineup. The Golden Knights are also facing injuries to forwards Jonas Rondbjerg, William Karlsson, and Brett Howden – straining the team’s offensive depth. Right-winger Alexander Holtz is currently Vegas’ only extra forward and could be in line for a return to the lineup as a result. Holtz appeared in five games in February, recording three points and eight shots on net. He has racked up nine points and a minus-one in 28 games this season, often from a fourth-line role in Vegas’ lineup.
Stone’s hole in the top-six will put more pressure on Pavel Dorofeyev, Ivan Barbashev, and Braeden Bowman to step into bigger, scoring roles. The trio rank fifth, sixth, and seventh on the Vegas offense in scoring – with 47, 42, and 23 points respectively. They will fill major roles as Vegas looks towards tough matchups against the Sabres, Detroit Red Wings, and Minnesota Wild over their next three games.
Dominic James Out Eight-To-Ten Weeks After Surgery
Tampa Bay Lightning rookie forward Dominic James will be sidelined for an eight-to-ten week period after undergoing surgery for a lower-body injury, Lightning team reporter Benjamin Pierce announced today.
James was placed on injured reserve earlier this week, and it had been indicated that James’ injury would not be of the short-term variety, even if at the time a more detailed timeline had yet to be determined. Now, it is clear the Lightning will be without James for a crucial stretch of their season.
James, 23, has been playing out his first full season as a professional. A four-year player at the University of Minnesota-Duluth, James has managed seven goals and 15 points across 43 NHL games, to go along with five points in four AHL games. He’s averaged 12:14 time on ice per game in Tampa, including around forty seconds per game on the man advantage.
Originally a member of the Chicago Blackhawks organization, James elected to sign with Tampa Bay at the conclusion of his college career. Tampa’s prospect system is notably thinner than the Blackhawks, and as a result, James may have seen a clearer path to NHL time in the near-term in Tampa compared to Chicago – even though Chicago’s NHL roster has less high-end talent. That decision appears to have paid off, as James has spent most of the season in the NHL.
This injury is certainly a setback, but not one that is likely to have a real long-term impact. His performance this season remains an encouraging sign that a long NHL career could be ahead for James, even if it’s in more of a depth role.
Oilers Acquire Jason Dickinson, Colton Dach
9:50 p.m.: Both teams have now officially announced the trade, with the terms corresponding with what had been previously reported.
The conditions on the 2027 first-round pick received by the Blackhawks are as follows: if Edmonton’s 2027 first-rounder is inside the top-12 of the draft order, Edmonton may choose to transfer its 2028 first-round pick to Chicago instead, to be declared prior to the commencement of the 2027 draft. Should Edmonton choose to trade its 2028 first-rounder before the 2027 trade deadline, the 2027 first-round pick will automatically transfer, unconditionally.
7:30 p.m.: Friedman reported that young Blackhawks winger Colton Dach “is another part of this trade conversation to Edmonton.” His inclusion in the deal has not yet been confirmed, but it would help explain how the Blackhawks have managed (alongside the financial aspect of the deal) to land a first-round pick in the trade.
Dach, 23, is an Edmonton native who Bowman selected No. 62 overall in the 2021 draft. The 6’4″ pivot is the brother of Kirby Dach, a Montreal Canadiens center who Bowman selected No. 3 overall at the 2019 draft. Dach has broken into the NHL as a full-time player over the last calendar year, scoring seven points in 25 games last season and nine points in 53 games this season.
Entering the season, he was ranked as the No. 10 prospect in Chicago’s system by the team at Elite Prospects, and No. 10 by The Athletic’s Corey Pronman, who projected him as a future middle-six winger. Dach has averaged 11:40 time on ice per game this season.
6:18 p.m.: The Edmonton Oilers and Chicago Blackhawks are discussing a trade that would send veteran center Jason Dickinson to Edmonton, according to Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman. The move comes in the wake of today’s news, via Jason Gregor of Sports 1440 Edmonton, that veteran center Curtis Lazar of the Oilers is set to miss up to four weeks with an undisclosed injury.
According to Frank Seravalli of Frankly Hockey, the deal is currently still being discussed, but would involve Andrew Mangiapane heading the other way, to Chicago. Moving out Mangiapane and his $3.6MM cap hit is likely viewed as necessary for the Oilers to have the breathing room to add Dickinson’s $4.25MM cap hit to their books.
Sportsnet’s Mark Spector reported that the Blackhawks will retain 50% of Dickinson’s deal, meaning the Oilers should be able to comfortably fit in their new player’s cap hit with Mangiapane heading to Chicago.
In addition to those two pieces, Seravalli said the “framework of what’s been discussed” between Edmonton and Chicago includes “another piece” heading to the Oilers, and a conditional draft pick heading to Chicago. The Athletic’s Pierre LeBrun has added that as part of the deal, the Blackhawks will receive a top-12 protected 2027 first-round pick from Edmonton in exchange for Dickinson.
Undoubtedly, the Blackhawks’ decision to take on the full freight of Mangiapane’s contract, as well as retain half of Dickinson’s deal, has contributed to the significant asset they were able to extract from the Oilers.
The Athletic’s Scott Powers reported earlier today that the Blackhawks “don’t see a point” in trading Dickinson for a marginal return. If Dickinson is indeed dealt to the Oilers, it will be the second time this week that Edmonton has added a veteran player from Chicago. The Blackhawks traded veteran defenseman Connor Murphy to the Oilers on Monday, and it’s possible that, in the process of negotiating that trade, the possibility of a Dickinson deal was also discussed.
A key factor here is the presence of Oilers GM Stan Bowman. Bowman was the one who acquired Murphy back in 2017, during Bowman’s tenure as GM of the Blackhawks.
While he was no longer GM in Chicago when the team added Dickinson, he would undoubtedly still have many connections within the team’s hockey operations infrastructure, and therefore would potentially have more detailed information on Dickinson than another GM might have access to.
The fit for Dickinson in Edmonton is relatively easy to identify. While he’s not a right-shot center like Lazar, there are stylistic similarities between the two players. Dickinson, 30, is a 6’2″ true center who is a veteran of 549 NHL games. A pending UFA, Dickinson is playing out the final year of a $4.25MM AAV deal.
Early in his tenure in Chicago, it looked as though Dickinson was reaching new heights as an offensive producer. He scored 22 goals and 35 points in his debut campaign with the Blackhawks, riding a career-high 17.5% shooting percentage to a career year, one that landed him down-ballot Selke Trophy consideration.
In the last two seasons, Dickinson’s offensive production has evaporated. In 106 NHL games over the course of 2024-25 and 2025-26, he has managed 13 goals and 29 points. But even though he hasn’t been able to sustain his prior levels of production, he remains a valuable contributor in the specific role he occupies. Dickinson wins just about half of his faceoffs, provides a physical edge, and anchors the Blackhawks’ penalty kill as its top center. When Chicago is defending a late lead or has a big defensive zone draw, more often than not, its Dickinson who hops over the boards first.
That’s the kind of set of skills Edmonton is likely looking for in advance of what it hopes will be another deep playoff run. With two of the game’s best scorers already on the roster, and one of the best offensive defensemen manning the blue line, the Oilers don’t need Dickinson to be his 22-goal, 35-point self for him to provide value in their lineup. If he can maximize his current role as an Oiler, trading for him will be more than worth the cost for Edmonton.
With Lazar’s health uncertain, it certainly makes sense to target a player of Dickinson’s mold. The two forwards occupying top spots on the depth chart with Edmonton’s AHL affiliate, the Bakersfield Condors, are not exact stylistic fits for when an injury is suffered by a defensive bottom-sixer. (Both Isaac Howard and Quinn Hutson are more offensively-oriented.)
The Athletic’s Chris Johnston noted an aspect of the trade that relates to a seemingly unrelated team – the San Jose Sharks. Per the terms of last season’s Jake Walman trade, in which Edmonton surrendered a top-12 protected 2026 first-round pick to San Jose, that pick would become unprotected if Edmonton were ever to trade its 2027 first-rounder. Because they have now done so, Edmonton’s 2026 first-round pick is now owned by the Sharks without restriction.
This is likely a moot point as Edmonton is well on course to secure a playoff spot. It’s nonetheless worth noting that in the event the Oilers endure a shocking fall down the standings, the Sharks are poised to profit.
In any case, the exact details of the trade are yet to be determined. What is clear, at least, is that Bowman isn’t done trying to add veteran help to his roster, and it appears the next area of interest is adding a bottom-six, penalty-killing center.
Photos courtesy of Chris Jones-Imagn Images