The Canucks are set to get a boost up front tonight against Montreal as winger Sven Baertschi is expected to be activated off injured reserve, notes Jason Botchford of the Vancouver Province. He suffered a jaw injury back on December 9th and despite being out of the lineup since then, he still sits fourth on the team in goals.
It isn’t all good news for Vancouver, however. After taking a puck to the mouth and losing multiple teeth on Saturday, defenseman Chris Tanev will not play tonight, reports Sportsnet’s Dan Murphy (Twitter link). He adds that there is nothing broken but that he will still need surgery. However, Tanev’s plan at this point is to play the next three games after tonight and then have the surgery when the Canucks have their bye week.
More injury notes from around the NHL:
- Islanders coach Doug Weight provided a brief update to reporters, including Alex Squadron of the New York Post, on winger Josh Bailey, who did not play this afternoon against New Jersey. While he stated that it’s not a long-term issue, he added that “It wasn’t horrific news, but certainly not good news”. Accordingly, it certainly sounds like there’s a chance that Bailey will miss time coming out of the bye week as well.
- Jets center Adam Lowry is dealing with an upper-body issue, Ken Wiebe of the Winnipeg Sun notes via Twitter. He was able to take the warmup before today’s game against San Jose so it doesn’t appear to be a serious issue but with Mark Scheifele already out, Winnipeg’s depth down the middle is getting tested. Lowry missing the game opened up the opportunity for 2015 first-rounder Jack Roslovic to make his NHL debut.
- Although they were forced to recall goalie Jared Coreau earlier today, the Red Wings don’t expect to be without netminder Jimmy Howard for long, GM Ken Holland told Gregg Krupa of The Detroit News. He’s dealing with a lower-body injury and while he will be re-evaluated on Thursday, the expectation is that he will be ready to make the start on Saturday against Pittsburgh.