RDS reports Staal done for season after tendon surgery

This morning, RDS (A French Canadian media outlet) reported that Jordan Staal had foot surgery and would miss the rest of the playoffs.  Several other outlets jumped on that, including TSN (RDS' English partner) who even said:

Staal underwent surgery Friday night to repair a severed tendon in his ankle and will be out for the remainder of the playoffs. It is the same injury that caused Andrei Markov to miss 35 games at the beginning of the season.

However it seems these initial reports jumped the gun a little.  TSN backed off the "out for playoffs" portion of the story when Bob McKenzie tweeted:

J Staal not necessarily out for playoffs. Had surgery to repair foot tendon that runs to toe, but could be back next round if not sooner

McKenzie's info came out just before Dan Bylsma adressed the media and said:

"[Staal had] surgery to repair a lacerated tendon in his foot....As far as a time frame goes we will not put a time frame on it at this point," Bylsma said. "But he has not been ruled out for a return."

You can never take a coach's word come injuries in playoffs, but had Staal's condition required season ending surgery, there's no reason NOT to announce that, and no reason to think the Penguins wouldn't do so.

Below is some of the original text talking about how big of a blow it'll be to lose Staal, without knowing how long that may be.

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Jordan Staal is a 3rd lne center, but not many 3rd line centers play 19-20 minutes a night and end up as a team's third highest scoring forward.  Throw in a deserved Selke nomination as a dominant defensive positionally on the PK and it only increases his value.  On top of all of that, there's durability.  Staal's played 383 of a possible 384 games since he turned pro in October 2006.  Aside from Robert Downey Jr. you'd be hard-pressed to find a better modern day Iron Man.

The Pens will have a lot of options in replacement: Maxime Talbot is a natural center and playing his best hockey of the season.  Mark Letestu looked good in the NHL in a brief cameo.  Craig Adams is a clutch playoff player that could pick up a little (but not all) of the slack too.

The Pittsburgh Penguins have taken long playoff runs based off their unmatched strength down the middle.  Without Jordan Staal, they'll lose that unique advantage.

So who knows...All that's sure is Staal had surgery, is out for a while.  How long that will be remains to be seen...Stay tuned.

This time of year in the hockey world there's only two types of injuries: upper and lower body.  Put Tyler Kennedy in the latter category.  For the Pittsburgh Penguins there's only one prognosis: the dreaded "day-to-day".  Put TK in there too:

Bylsma listed Tyler Kennedy as having a lower-body injury. His status is day-to-day. Kennedy was injured in the first period of Pittsburgh's 7-4 Game 4 victory at Ottawa on Tuesday.

Kennedy did not return but he did keep his equipment on for the rest of the game.

Short of having surgery, everyone's day-to-day in the Penguins' press releases.  Even Jordan Leopold, who was knocked unconscious and appears to be out for the forseeable future in technically day-to-day.  But that Kennedy was able to keep his stuff on and stay on the bench seems to be a good sign.

Hopefully if the Penguins can get out of their first round series as soon as possible -- something they were unable to do last season to make it through the Eastern Conference grind when both early series went 6 and 7 games.  Favored seeds New Jersey and Buffalo are struggling, but they may yet at least push their series deep, which would give about a week for the Pens to rest their bumps and bruises from the Ottawa series.

To do that, however, they'll have to win the hardest game of the series against Ottawa on Thursday.  It won't be easy, but the rewards could be plentiful.

Just when the tide was ebbing to almost full strength of health, it crests with the news that forward Chris Kunitz did not practice today.

Head coach Dan Bylsma updated the status for Chris Kunitz. The Penguins winger left the team's 4-3 overtime win over Atlanta on Saturday and did not return. He did not practice Monday and is listed as day-to-day with an undisclosed injury.

Not the most informative of updates, but hey it's the Penguins and there's one week left of the regular season, what do you expect?  No word if Kunitz will miss any time, however it's probably a good bet that he will not be in uniform tomorrow night for the big game against the Washington Capitals.

Hopefully, whatever is the latest to ail Kunitz (who's been injured for 28 games this season) it'll be something to heal quickly so that he can be ready to go for the post-season.  We'll keep an eye on it, if any news breaks check in here or throw up a fanpost and we'll debate.

From the PG:

From the team:

The Penguins recieved good news on Monday in regards to the recent injury to star forward Evgeni Malkin. The defending Art Ross and Conn Smythe champion suffered an undisclosed injury after being hit with a shot in Pittsburgh's 2-1 victory at Tampa Bay Sunday evening.

Though the injury could have been more severe, x-ray results showed nothing was broken, and Malkin is being listed as day-to-day by the team.

We'll wait and see how Malkin progresses, obviously this is about the best news we could get.  The Pens have two days off but then begin another taxing stretch of playing five games in eight nights, and 7 games in 12 days.

It remains to be seen when Malkin can re-join the lineup, but day-to-day with no fractures revealed is sure better than week-to-week with damage.

From the official site:

Penguins head coach Dan Bylsma announced that forward Eric Godard will miss the next 4-6 weeks with a groin injury.

"Eric Godard is 4-6 weeks with a groin injury," Bylsma said. "He is still be evaluated with where he is at with that. It will be long term."

Not a huge loss for on the ice, as Godard averages just 4:15 of icetime per game.  But his presence at the end of the bench may have deterred some abuse for Pens top players (I'm thinking about Donald Brashear burying Sidney Crosby in the corner after Godard left with his injury).

The Penguins only have eight games before the Olympic Break, and will be on leave until March 2nd -- which will be five weeks from the time of Godard's injury.  So it's possible they may not miss their bodyguard for many actual games, even if he'll be hurt for a month or longer.

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Pittsburgh's schedule sure isn't getting any easier these next few games.  With the Islanders, Capitals, Flyers and Rangers on tap between now and January 25, you'd hope the Pens can send out their healthy players to hopefully gain some points (or at least not give up two) in the Eastern Conference standings.

With that said, Rob Rossi is reporting in today's Tribune-Review that Marc-Andre Fleury likely won't return until late (emphasis mine) this week.

Fleury participated in the Penguins' morning practice but said he "could not do a whole lot" with his glove hand. He was injured Thursday in a win at Edmonton when a puck caught his glove awkwardly during a second-period save.

I suppose there are many questions to ask, but the main one has to revolve around Brent Johnson.  That same article suggests Johnson's listed as day to day, but if he's not healthy by Tuesday night to take on the Islanders, will he be ready to step it up against the Caps on Thursday?  Even if he does return, will he be at 100%? 

As detrimental as these injuries may be for the Pens, you can at least appreciate the fact that they came late in the road trip.  Had the Pens kicked the five-game trip off with two minor league goaltenders starting between the pipes, you can only imagine what the outcome of events would've been.  Especially after witnessing last night's debacle in Vancouver.

Alex Pechurski, for all the awesomeness surrounding his play and third star nomination last night, likely won't see play in the NHL again for the rest of the season.  His call up was more a matter of convenience than anything else.  Now that the Pens are returning home, more specifically back east, it would seem more likely that the Pens will rely on WBS backup goaltender Brad Thiessen to fill that void if needed.  With any luck, it won't be necessary.

Any thoughts on Pittsburgh's recent goaltending issues?