Predators’ Luke Evangelista Out Four Weeks With Lower-Body Injury
Predators winger Luke Evangelista will be sidelined for the next four weeks with a lower-body injury, head coach Barry Trotz told Robby Stanley of NHL.com on Thursday.
Evangelista, 22, left Tuesday’s loss to the Jets in the first period after his right leg got tangled up while being hit by Winnipeg defenseman Neal Pionk. Jonathan Marchessault and Steven Stamkos also got banged up in the game but aren’t carrying injury designations today, per Trotz, and haven’t been ruled for Saturday’s tilt against the Capitals.
Trotz also gave updates on some already-injured-reserve-bound players, telling Stanley that defensemen Jeremy Lauzon and Adam Wilsby have been downgraded from day-to-day to week-to-week with their lower-body and upper-body injuries, respectively.
Evangelista has not yet joined the pair on IR, although he’s definitely eligible for a placement since he’ll miss more than seven days. With two open roster spots entering the day, the Predators have plenty of recall flexibility and don’t need to open a spot yet.
Through 39 games this season, Evangelista was struggling to capture the form that placed him ninth in Calder Trophy voting last season. Like many of his Nashville teammates, he’s struggling to finish. He’s shooting at just 5.3%, good for four goals through 39 games. He had 16 tallies in 80 games last season while finishing at a 9.3% clip, ranking fourth on the team with 172 shots on goal.
Evangelista has also been one of the Preds’ most frequent shooters this year, ranking sixth with 75. He’s seeing less usage per game, however, averaging 12:51 per night compared to 13:57 last season.
The 6’0″, 183-lb forward was a second-round pick by Nashville in 2020 and has 68 points in 143 NHL games to date. 14 of those points have come this season, placing him seventh on the fledgling club in scoring.
Evangelista has spent most of his time this season on a line with Mark Jankowski and Thomas Novak, which has been Nashville’s best unit at controlling possession quality at 5-on-5 with a 59.7% expected goals share, per MoneyPuck. It hasn’t translated to actual results, though, with the trio getting outscored 4-2. They’ve scored just 1.04 goals per 60 minutes compared to 3.84 expected goals per 60 minutes.
The pending restricted free agent will be replaced in the lineup by Zachary L’Heureux, who’s eligible to play after serving a three-game suspension for slew-footing Wild captain Jared Spurgeon on New Year’s Eve.
AHL Shuffle: 3/4/23
While there were plenty of recalls yesterday following paper demotions to the minors to maintain AHL eligibility, some of those moves will come today instead. We’ll keep track of those transactions here while non-paper recalls will be covered separately.
- The Lightning announced that they’ve recalled defenseman Darren Raddysh from AHL Syracuse. The 27-year-old played for Tampa Bay in Thursday’s loss to Pittsburgh but has spent most of the year with the Crunch, picking up 50 points in 50 games to put him second among all AHL rearguards in scoring.
- The Penguins announced (Twitter link) the recall of forward Drew O’Connor from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. The 24-year-old last played in the AHL three months ago and since then, he has been a regular most nights with Pittsburgh, recording five goals and three assists in 27 games.
- The Flames have recalled wingers Walker Duehr and Jakob Pelletier from AHL Calgary, per the AHL’s transactions log. Both players were papered down on Friday. Duehr has four points in 17 games with the Flames so far this season while Pelletier has seven points in 16 contests, five of which have come in Calgary’s last five outings.
- Nashville has recalled forwards John Leonard and Luke Evangelista from Milwaukee after sending them down yesterday, per the AHL’s transactions log. Leonard scored in his first game of the season with the Predators on Thursday while Evangelista has an assist over his first two NHL appearances.
- The Kings have recalled centers Rasmus Kupari and Quinton Byfield, per the AHL’s transactions log. Kupari has spent most of the year with Los Angeles, getting into 47 games with them compared to 11 with the Reign while Byfield has suited up 34 times for the Kings compared to 16 in Ontario. These quick demotions will keep them eligible to play in the AHL postseason.
- The Avalanche announced (Twitter link) they have sent down Ben Meyers to the Colorado Eagles. Meyers has played 34 games in the NHL this season with the Avalanche, scoring one goal and zero assists.
This post will be updated throughout the day.
Evening Notes: Van Riemsdyk, Leonard, Marchand, Motte
According to TSN’s Chris Johnston, the Philadelphia Flyers intend to move pending unrestricted free agent James van Riemsdyk. On today’s TSN Insider Trading, Johnston reported that two interested teams appear to be the Vegas Golden Knights and the Winnipeg Jets. Vegas GM Kelly McCrimmon has been busy the last few days, swinging a trade today for goaltender Jonathan Quick and yesterday acquiring center Teddy Blueger. Cap space could be an issue as Vegas has just $3MM left and van Riemsdyk is currently playing under a $7MM cap hit. Winnipeg, on the other hand, have been very quiet since acquiring winger Nino Niederreiter from the Nashville Predators. Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff has over $4.5MM in cap space for the deadline, so he could easily fit van Riemsdyk under budget, should the Flyers be willing to retain 50% to facilitate a move.
Some other notes from across the NHL:
- The Nashville Predators have been one of the busier sellers in recent days, having shipped out Mattias Ekholm, Mikael Granlund, and Tanner Jeannot with an eye toward building for the future. With all the pieces moving out, the Predators have begun the process of calling up some of their younger players. Luke Evangelista received the first call-up of his career earlier this week, and now Nashville has announced that John Leonard has been recalled to the big club. Leonard,24, is a former 2018 sixth-round pick who is currently tied for third in scoring on Milwaukee this season with 32 points. Leonard does have NHL experience on his resume, having dressed in 58 games with the San Jose Sharks, where he tallied 15 points.
- Brad Marchand left tonight’s Boston Bruins contest against the Buffalo Sabres with an apparent lower-body injury. Marchand was hit awkwardly into the boards from behind and the Bruins announced that he would not return. Losing Marchand for any length of time would be a big blow to a Bruins team that has Stanley Cup aspirations. Marchand is having another fine season with 53 points in 52 games and has heated up recently after going pointless in five straight games. Boston is nearly a lock to win the President’s Trophy, so they likely won’t rush Marchand back, but should his injury keep him out long-term, it could become problematic.
- NHL.com’s Dan Rosen has reported that New York Rangers forward Tyler Motte would not be returning to tonight’s game against the Ottawa Senators. Motte was just dealt by the Senators to the Rangers on February 19th and was injured after taking a headshot from former teammate Austin Watson. Watson was assessed a five-minute major for charging and a game misconduct. Motte was beginning his second run with the Rangers after being dealt there last trade deadline from Vancouver. He has dealt with concussion issues in the past, having missed 31 games in 2020-21 while with the Canucks. Hopefully, Motte can make a speedy recovery after the very scary injury tonight.
Nashville Predators Recall Luke Evangelista
The Nashville Predators are headed in a new direction, and it is time to check out some of the organization’s prospects. The team has recalled Luke Evangelista from the Milwaukee Admirals, the first call-up of his short professional career.
Selected 42nd overall in 2020, the impressive development of Evangelista has gone largely unnoticed by the media, partly because of the missing season in 2020-21 and his return to the OHL in 2021-22.
After playing just 14 games in his post-draft year because of the COVID restrictions that canceled the OHL’s season, Evangelista returned to the London Knights last year and went on a rampage. With 55 goals and 111 points in 62 games as captain of the powerhouse junior program, he showed that a lost year had no impact on his offensive development.
In 49 games with the Admirals this year, he has continued that upward trajectory with 41 points, even if his goal-scoring totals have come back down to earth. Now, following the trades of Nino Niederreiter and Tanner Jeannot, plus more that could be coming down the pipe for Nashville, Evangelista will get his chance at the highest level.
Even if the rest of this season isn’t much fun for Predators fans, they will have some exciting young faces to watch.
Luke Evangelista Assigned To AHL
With the Milwaukee Admirals already up 2-0 over the Manitoba Moose, they will get another reinforcement for their Calder Cup run. The Nashville Predators announced today that Luke Evangelista has been assigned to the AHL club.
Evangelista, 20, led the OHL in goals this season with 55 and came fourth in overall points with 111. The London Knights captain truly looked as though he was a whole level above his competition at times, toying with them before threading a pass to a teammate or beating a goaltender with his wicked wrist shot. The Predators certainly would have been happy with his development since making him the 42nd overall pick in 2020, as he looks ready to take the next step and become a top contributor at the AHL level.
In fact, Evangelista is one of the players that actually already has substantial AHL experience. He played in 14 games for the Chicago Wolves last season when the OHL canceled their season due to COVID-19 and had four points. Had he reached the 20-game mark that would have made him eligible to stay there this year, it seems likely that he would have already taken that step. Instead, he was just one of the most dominant players in the OHL, captaining the program that is well-known as an NHL player factory.