Injury Update: Sam Gagner, Dylan Holloway expected to be ready when Oilers face Senators on Saturday

It looks like the Edmonton Oilers will be getting a couple of forwards back from injury this weekend.

According to Daniel Nugent-Bowman of The Athletic, head coach Kris Knoblauch said that Sam Gagner and Dylan Holloway won’t play against the Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday, but they should be ready when the Oilers host the Ottawa Senators in their next game on Saturday.

Gagner has been out of the lineup since the team’s 6-3 victory over the New Jersey Devils back before the Christmas break. He missed their subsequent game against the New York Rangers with an undisclosed injury and didn’t travel with the Oilers when they went on their three-game trip through California last week.

The 34-year-old signed a one-year, league-minimum contract with the Oilers after undergoing hip surgery in the off-season. Now in his third go-around with the team, Edmonton’s first-round pick from the 2007 draft has four goals and nine points across 18 games while logging an average of 10:56 per night.

Holloway suffered a knee injury when he fell awkwardly into the boards during a win over the New York Islanders back in November. It was unfortunate timing for the 22-year-old, as he had just scored his first goal of the season in the previous game against the Seattle Kraken.

Now in the third year of his entry-level contract, injuries have been a theme for Holloway throughout his professional career. A wrist injury suffered while playing in the NCAA playoffs for the Wisconsin Badgers delayed Holloway’s 2021-22 debut to January and a shoulder injury resulted in him missing over a month of action in 2022-23.

The Oilers didn’t place Gagner on the Injured Reserve so a transaction won’t be required for him to draw back into the lineup. That won’t be the case with Holloway, as he was placed on the Long Term Injured Reserve for salary cap relief. We’ll most likely see Adam Erne optioned to the American Hockey League to make room for Holloway.