ANAHEIM – Patrick Eaves has a lot more time on his hands than he ever wanted. His mother, Beth, sensed that from a distance and sent him something to shake the boredom and keep him busy.

“She’s funny,” said Eaves, the sidelined Ducks winger. “She sent me a Lego set of a real car. Seven hours yesterday, I was sitting there putting it together. I got it done.

“It was obsessive. She knows me pretty well.”

Perhaps it isn’t a surprise that Eaves is pretty determined off the ice. His work in front of the opposition’s net and touch on the power play are ingredients the Ducks sorely miss. A significant right leg injury in the Ducks’ second-round series against Edmonton has him sidelined.

It will be for a while. Eaves hasn’t played since Game 3 against the Oilers after getting hurt on a play in which he got into an awkward entanglement with an opposing player. It wasn’t the result of a collision with Patrick Maroon as had been suspected, but the injury had him in a boot on his right foot.

Some progress has been made. Eaves is no longer in a boot and has shed the crutches he hobbled on for a few days, a development he heartily welcomed. It has allowed him to start doing some off-ice workouts.

“It helped the healing process,” Eaves said. “It wasn’t fun being on them. As soon as I felt like I was able to move, I got rid of them as soon as possible.”

The return of the bearded winger won’t be so quick. Ducks general manager Bob Murray sounded a ray of hope when he suggested Eaves might be back at some point after initially preparing to lose him for the season. Eaves also wouldn’t put a timeline but shared that hope.

“But that’s kind of the long term,” Eaves said. “Every day, I have little tests that I have to pass. If I feel good, then I can try something else. It’s slow but it’s something. That’s more my focus. I know if I pass a lot of those, then hopefully I’ll get out there sooner.”

Eaves has dealt with significant injuries in his career and said each situation is different. The frustrating thing, he said, about this one is that he’s had an impact on a team that has “a good chance to do something special.”

Until then, the 33-year-old forward will let out his inner child and tackle the toy that was a favorite of his childhood.

“Especially when you want to be doing something and you’re sitting here watching it,” Eaves said. “That’s why I did the Lego set yesterday. Just trying to occupy my mind. You can only read and watch TV so much.”

FIGHTING WORDS

Ducks center Ryan Kesler makes a lot of enemies on the ice with his persistent physical checking style. No area is left alone and Predators center Ryan Johansen voiced his frustrations with the Selke Trophy finalist after Game 2.

“He just blows my mind,” Johansen said. “I don’t know what’s going through his head out there. His family and his friends watching him play, I don’t know how you cheer for a guy like that. It just doesn’t make sense how he plays the game.

“I’m just trying to go out there and play hockey. It sucks when you have to pull a stick out of your groin every shift.”

In a post-game interview with Sportsnet’s Christine Simpson, Kesler said, “I play the game hard and obviously he doesn’t like that.”

Edmonton’s Connor McDavid mostly shrugged off Kesler’s many chops and slashes in their matchups, refraining to go public with any complaints.

WRECKING BOLL

The playoffs for winger Jared Boll have mirrored his regular season – a lot of game nights the warm-up before the game is the extent of his action.

But the second round saw Boll being tapped for duty against Edmonton and now he has found himself in the lineup for three straight games. It is limited work – four to six minutes – but Boll has to deliver hits and be responsible, with the ideal thing to provide a jolt of energy for the next line to feed on.

“It’s fun,” Boll said. “Obviously this is the time of the year you want to be playing. You just got to stay ready because you never know when your number’s going to get called and spotted in. What better time of the year than to be playing right now. Just trying to contribute any way you can.”

Perhaps the epitome of his value in the eyes of Ducks coach Randy Carlyle came during Game 1 against Nashville when he knocked Calle Jarnkrok off his skates with a hard, clean check that had a sellout Honda Center roaring.

“You can definitely feel the crowd and hear them,” Boll said. “Our line and our whole team, that’s the way we want to play. We want to be physical and hard on them. It’s a fine line too. You can’t put your team down a man. It’s so important this time of year.

“We know what we have to do. On the other hand we have to stay out of the box and just play them hard.”

Carlyle said he wanted Boll in the lineup in a physical series and keep the Predators from taking liberties against his players.

“We just feel that in certain situations and where we play that we need that element,” Carlyle said. “And Boller has been a great teammate. He stood up for this hockey club all year. He went out and he’s been physical and disciplined. And he understands his role.”

MINOR CALLUPS

The Ducks saw the top farm team get eliminated from the Calder Cup playoffs, but that also allowed them to add some reinforcements.

Goaltender Jhonas Enroth and forwards Nic Kerdiles and Sam Carrick were called up from the American Hockey League’s San Diego Gulls. The Gulls’ season ended Saturday with a Game 5 loss to the San Jose Barracuda in their second-round series.

Enroth, the organization’s No. 3 netminder, will serve in an emergency capacity and won’t be an option unless John Gibson or Jonathan Bernier is not available due to injury or illness. Kerdiles has played in two playoff games with the Ducks while Carrick has yet to appear in one.