Although he tore his ACL nearly seven weeks ago, Blues forward Robby Fabbri only underwent surgery to fix the ligament on Tuesday, notes Jim Thomas of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The team revealed that there were no complications with the procedure and that there is no timetable to return. A return this season is highly unlikely as these injuries can take between six-to-nine months to heal while the team will likely want to be cautious considering this is the second time in less than a year that he required this surgery after also tearing the same ACL back in February.
Elsewhere in the Central:
- Blackhawks defenseman Gustav Forsling is expected to make his return to the lineup on Thursday, reports Mark Lazerus of the Chicago Sun-Times. He has missed the last three games with an upper-body injury. To make room for him, the team is expected to shift Jan Rutta back to his natural right side which could push offseason acquisition Connor Murphy out of the lineup for a fourth time this season.
- After landing Kyle Turris via trade over the weekend, the Predators are getting closer to getting another center back in their lineup as Nick Bonino is nearing a return to game action, notes Adam Vingan of The Tennessean. Bonino has missed the last ten games due to a lower-body injury sustained back on October 14th. Considering the team gave him a four-year, $16.4MM contract back in the summer, it will be interesting to see if they deploy him as their third line center or if they opt instead to try him on the wing inside their top-six.
- Speaking of Turris, Vingan reports in the same column that he has gone through the immigration visa process, freeing him up to join the team. The Predators are off until Saturday and it’s expected that Turris will make his Nashville debut in that game against Pittsburgh.