Boston Bruins Head Coach Bruce Cassidy said in a Tuesday interview that a few players were taking at least one practice off this week. Cassidy mentioned that and Jake DeBrusk was facing “lower-body discomfort”, Chris Wagner was “under the weather” and Brad Marchand and Patrice Bergeron both took maintenance days. The news from Cassidy is not much of a shock as there have been way too many Bruins injuries this year.
The part of Cassidy’s press conference that raised a flag was that he was about to say that DeBrusk had an “injury” but stopped about halfway through and used the word “discomfort” instead.
Injury and Illness
Cassidy’s disclosure of DeBrusk’s lower-body issue does not have a timetable and has the potential to be worrisome. DeBrusk has 14 goals and 3 assists in 37 games this season and is a valuable player to the Bruins lineup. He shows this every time he takes a shift. Cassidy changing the description to “discomfort” may be a sign that he doesn’t expect him to be out for long, if at all.
The Bruins expect to know the status of Wagner and DeBrusk well before the 7:30 game against the Philadelphia Flyers. Illness is not usually a huge worry, as the player is typically out for only a couple of days. So Wagner, if he does not play tonight, would likely be set to play in their game on Thursday at home against the St. Louis Blues.
Bergeron and the All-Star Game
Injuries have been prevalent in the Bruins lineup this year. Patrice Bergeron has already missed over a month of the season with an injured upper-body. It was only recently that Bergeron came back and began taking his regular shifts again. Since his return, Bergeron has five goals and eight assists in 11 games for the Bruins.
The NHL All-Star game will give Bergeron more time to rest. He did not make the original cut, but when the league announced that he was a candidate for the “Last Man In”, fans actively discouraged each other from voting him in so that he could take the time to fully recover.
Marchand expected to play
A maintenance day for Marchand was a surprise after he seemed to be fine after a game in which he scored a high, glove-side goal and notched an assist for the Bruins in their 3-2 OT loss to the Montreal Canadiens. It was said that Marchand would be fine for tonight’s game against the Flyers though.
Marchand’s 17 goals and 32 assists were not enough to earn him a spot in the All-Star Game. So if he does have something going wrong, he will have those days this year to rest that he did not have a year ago.
Looking forward
Although injuries are common, especially for this Bruins team, having four players miss practice the day before a conference game is not a good thing. It appears that each of the Bruins that missed Tuesday’s practice will fine long-term, but we will know for certain later this week.
As for their next game, Philadelphia is in second to last in the Eastern Conference, but no game is an easy one when it features two rivals.
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