Golden Knights’ Jack Eichel returns to lineup, Brayden McNabb week-to-week with upper-body injury
The Vegas Golden Knights got some good news and some bad news on the injury front on Friday.
The good news is star center Jack Eichel is back in the lineup for Friday’s game against the St. Louis Blues, but the bad news is defenseman Brayden McNabb is out of the lineup on a week-to-week basis with an upper-body injury.
JACK. IS. BACK. pic.twitter.com/dujqUIq1tk
— Vegas Golden Knights (@GoldenKnights) January 2, 2026Eichel had missed the last seven games with a lower-body injury. He also was dealing with an illness around the same time he first left the lineup, so that likely didn’t help his recovery. Despite missing almost three weeks of hockey, his status was day-to-day throughout his time out of the lineup. The Golden Knights went 1-4-2 during his absence.
Eichel returns to the lineup slotted alongside Ivan Barbashev and Braeden Bowman on the top line. This has been Eichel’s most common line combination at even strength, as the trio have held the goals even at 9-9 and has a 55.26% 5v5 expected goal share in 169:13 of ice time.
Eichel will also return to the top power play unit with Pavel Dorofeyev, Mark Stone, Mitch Marner and Noah Hanifin.
Eichel has been excellent when he’s been healthy this season, as he has 12 goals and 29 assists for 41 points in 31 games, and is on pace for a career-high 99 points.
VGK has termed Brayden McNabb as week-to-week with an upper-body injury.
— SinBin.vegas (@SinBinVegas) January 2, 2026McNabb sustained his upper-body injury during the Golden Knights’ 4-2 loss to the Nashville Predators when he was hit hard by Michael Bunting. He left midway through the second period and did not return to the game, with his status unknown until Friday’s update.
McNabb has been underwhelming as far as production goes, as he has just two goals and one assist for three points in 38 games, which has him on pace for the lowest point total in a full season in his career. However, he’s better known for his defensive game, as he has a -0.082 5v5 regularized adjusted plus-minus expected goals against per 60 minutes.
To accommodate for his injury, the Golden Knights recalled defenseman Jaycob Megna from the AHL on Thursday. He’ll slot onto the bottom pair alongside Ben Hutton. Megna has two goals and four assists for six points in 23 games with the Henderson Silver Knights this season.