The Edmonton Oilers were forced to play their last two games short one player, but last night could’ve been worse had an NHL rule blocked emergency recall Noah Philp from playing.

The Oilers initiated an emergency recall of Noah Philp for last night’s game, invoked because the team had already played with a short roster and don’t have cap space for one more call up.

NHL rule nearly prevented Noah Philp from playing for Edmonton Oilers last night

Oilers insider Jason Gregor shared an update about the rare situation that nearly broke an NHL rule.

Because Philp was called up with the emergency clause, he had to replace a player that wasn’t playing last game against Anaheim. When McDavid insisted on returning to the lineup, that meant the captain was essentially the replacement, and the Oilers didn’t meet conditions for an emergency recall anymore.

That’s why the Oilers had to place veteran defenceman John Klingberg on the LTIR, and in doing so, giving them the salary cap space to allow Philp to play.

For these reasons, the Klingberg signing is becoming really costly for the Oilers. His $1.7M contract has provided no real positive to the Oilers as their worst depth defence option, and his contract is preventing call ups.

McDavid stepped in to stop Oilers from playing shorthanded again

Unfortunately, these roster moves needed up not making a difference for the Oilers playing shorthanded. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Jake Walman being last minute scratches threw a wrench into the plans.

Seeing the Oilers heavily depleted roster last night, it appears Connor McDavid put his stake in and said he was going to return to play. The team was already likely slow-playing him to be healthy for playoffs, but he insisted to play.

The Oilers are dealing with so many critical injuries at the worst time of year, that they almost have to discard any results in the last stretch of games just to prioritize health.