Leo Carlsson was still answering questions in English this weekend when the Ducks’ 21-year-old center switched to Swedish for a staffer, then smiled at the challenge in front of him. Anaheim’s top-line center is about to make his playoff debut against the Oilers, who bring Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl into a series that starts with Carlsson trying to steady a Ducks team back in the postseason for the first time in eight years.
“I think it’s a good challenge for us and for me, too,” Carlsson said. “First playoff game, too, so just going to be pumped up to go either way.”
Carlsson finished second on the Ducks in goals and points this season, and Anaheim will need that production to carry into a matchup where Edmonton’s stars have been the league’s defining playoff scorers. McDavid and Draisaitl have scored the most playoff points over the last two postseasons, with McDavid piling up 75 points during the Oilers’ consecutive runs to the Stanley Cup Final and Draisaitl adding 64. That is the scale of the task facing a Ducks group that has spent most of the past eight years outside the bracket and now walks straight into the deepest end of it.
Joel Quenneville would not get specific before the team left for Edmonton on Sunday about how often Carlsson would be matched against either of Edmonton’s two Hart Trophy winners. He did not hide the size of the assignment, either. “I think it’s going to be a team effort because they play so much,” the coach said. “You get icings, so everybody’s going to get exposure to them. Pick your poison. But be excited about the opportunity to play against them.”
The teams met three times in the regular season, and the details of those games offer a preview of how hard it may be to keep Edmonton’s stars in check. The Oilers had the last change in two of the meetings because they were at home, giving them control over some of the matchups. In the March 28 game, a 4-2 Edmonton win, Draisaitl was out with a lower-body injury and McDavid scored against Anaheim’s fourth line, with Ryan Poehling and Mikael Granlund often taking those shifts against him.
The Ducks had a different answer in their 6-5 comeback win in Anaheim on Feb. 25. Quenneville often put Carlsson out when McDavid was on the ice, and Carlsson responded with a goal and the primary assist on Cutter Gauthier’s late winner. When Draisaitl later replaced McDavid during the closing stages, the look changed but the problem did not. Carlsson said the lesson was simple: “You have to have a little more respect for Connor’s speed, obviously,” he said. That respect now comes with the stakes of a playoff series and the speed of a first postseason night.
For Anaheim, this is not just about surviving the opening game. It is about whether Carlsson can turn a breakout regular season into the kind of playoff start that tells the Ducks their rebuild has reached a harder stage. For Edmonton, the order remains familiar: lean on McDavid and Draisaitl, force the other side to chase, and let the series tilt from there.
