The Columbus Blue Jackets are finally back home after a five-day, cross-county, multiple time-zone road trip that saw them gain only three of a possible 10 points. They get their chance at revenge on Thursday night.
The Edmonton Oilers provide the opposition at Nationwide Arena just three days after they pulled off a stunning, late comeback to defeat the Blue Jackets in overtime 5-4. Former Blue Jacket Jack Roslovic was the hero. He was the hero in Philadelphia on Wednesday as well scoring that overtime winner. Should he do it again Thursday night, he would make NHL history scoring three straight OT winners.
As for the Blue Jackets, the news on captain Boone Jenner was not good.
Jenner Out Longer Term
Jenner was forced to leave the game Tuesday night in Seattle with an upper-body injury. It was originally announced by the team that his return was questionable.
Head coach Dean Evason shed some light on the situation. While he didn’t share specific details, he conceded one important piece of information.
“I don’t have a sense,” Evason said. “He’s not (playing) tonight and it’s not short term.”
Evason went on to say he didn’t know exactly when it happened. The team has been through this before with Jenner and extended absences. It’s next man up.
“We’ve got a lot of leaders in that room,” Evason said. “Obviously, Boone is a huge part of our group, our identity, all those things. He drives our work ethic no question, but we have other guys that do that as well. We expect everybody to do that and lead as he has and does on a consistent basis.”
“Will we miss him? Sure. No question when you have a guy like that come out of your lineup and you need people to step up. We have no doubt that people will.”
The lines were of course impacted by Jenner’s injury. Here’s how they skated on Thursday morning.
- Luca Del Bel Belluz – Sean Monahan – Kent Johnson
- Dmitri Voronkov – Adam Fantilli – Kirill Marchenko
- Cole Sillinger – Charlie Coyle – Mathieu Olivier
- Miles Wood – Isac Lundestrom – Yegor Chinakhov
- Zach Werenski – Ivan Provorov
- Denton Mateychuk – Damon Severson
- Jake Christiansen – Dante Fabbro
- Jet Greaves starts. Elvis Merzlikins backs up
Johnson’s Healthy Scratch
It wasn’t initially known if Kent Johnson’s scratch Tuesday in Seattle was due to illness or if it was a healthy scratch. Evason confirmed the truth on Thursday morning.
“He was not sick,” Evason said.
Johnson’s start to the 2025-26 season hasn’t gone according to plan. He has 2-3-5 in 15 games. He’s been up and down the lineup. He’s been on the top power-play unit but not getting the numbers we’re used to seeing.
Evason wants to see a few things from Johnson moving forward.
“Just some compete. Some bite. Just sticking his nose in there,” Evason said of Johnson. “He knows exactly. We’ve had enough chats and as I think you guys know now, it’s that we talk and give the player the opportunity to do the things that we believe a player needs to do in order to help us win hockey games. And if it consistently doesn’t happen, then that’s the end result.”
Dean Evason confirmed Kent Johnson was a health scratch in Seattle. He’s back in tonight. #CBJ
— Mark Scheig (@mark_scheig) November 13, 2025
Evason confirmed Johnson will return to the lineup Thursday against the Oilers.
Especially with Jenner’s absence, everyone including Johnson needs to step up. In over 40 minutes of power play time, Johnson has yet to record a point. All five of his points have been at even strength. Johnson is just one of three players with at least 40 minutes of power play time to not record a point. The others are Jamie Drysdale and Sam Rinzel according to Nat Stat Trick.
The Blue Jackets want to play a north and south game as opposed to an east and west game. The message to Johnson is clear. They want him to compete and to play harder while focusing on a more direct game.
Let’s see if one game off was just what he needed to find himself.
