Shocking moment Oilers’ Darnell Nurse gets hit in the FACE by a puck – without a helmet on – in warmups… before bloodied defenseman plays 20 minutes in Edmonton loss to Carolina

Edmonton defenseman Darnell Nurse’s face was left bloodied from a self-inflicted wound on Wednesday, in a painfully fitting metaphor for the Oilers’ early season struggles.

Nurse was warming up in Raleigh ahead of the game against the Carolina Hurricanes when he took a wrist shot that deflected off the crossbar and directly back towards his face.

Unfortunately, the NHL veteran wasn’t wearing his helmet, which might have prevented the puck from smashing into his nose. Nurse quickly skated over to the tunnel to return to the locker room, before returning with a bloody face and cotton in each nostril.

Nurse did live up to the sport’s greatest cliché (‘he’s a hockey player’), and still played 20 minutes in the 6-3 defeat.

But he wasn’t the only member of the Oilers to suffer a pre-game mishap. Goaltender Stuart Skinner lost an edge to one of his skates, and spent a small portion of the warmup skate sliding around the ice.

Nurse lived up to the sport’s greatest cliché (‘he’s a hockey player’), and still played 20 minutes

And Skinner’s night wouldn’t get any better.

The Edmonton native was pulled with 5:12 left in the first period after Carolina’s fourth goal. It’s the first time the Oilers have made an in-game goalie change since the season opener.

The first-period spree set the tone as the Oilers never recovered.

‘We haven’t had a game like that where we score on all our chances,’ Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. ‘It was nice, obviously, to get those to go in and have them have to chase the game. That’s definitely the way to do it.’

Skinner (left) was pulled in favor of Calvin Pickard after giving up four first-period goals 

Jesper Fast, Jack Drury, Martin Necas and Brent Burns also scored for Carolina. Jalen Chatfield had two assists.

Zach Hyman scored twice and Mattias Ekholm also had a goal for the Oilers, who dropped to 2-8 in road games. They’ve lost three in a row following a three-game winning streak.

‘We didn’t do ourselves any favors,’ Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch said. ‘We made it hard.’

The 5-12-1 Oilers play again on Friday in Washington.