The Boston Bruins have overcome various injuries throughout this season and they’ll have to do it again for at least another month. On Tuesday, the Bruins announced that Charlie McAvoy has been diagnosed with a sprained MCL. He’ll be re-evaluated in four weeks.
The injury occurred early in Saturday’s game against the Montreal Canadiens, when a battle between Brendan Gallagher and Zdeno Chara resulted in McAvoy getting tripped. It’s a huge blow for the Bruins, who are already without center Patrice Bergeron for the next couple of weeks.
“Could have been worse obviously....We’ll be without Charlie for a little bit, we have lots of depth and he will be back...Hopefully he heals quick and keeps his conditioning up,” Bruce Cassidy said after Tuesday’s morning skate.
McAvoy, 20, has seven goals, 32 points and a plus-26 rating in his first full season with the Bruins. He’s averaging just over 22 minutes of ice time per game in 2017-18.
Head coach Bruce Cassidy has already mentioned that Brandon Carlo could move up to the top pairing with Zdeno Chara in McAvoy’s absence.
Pairs tonight vs. Red Wings.
— Joe McDonald (@JoeyMacHockey) March 6, 2018
Chara-Carlo
Krug-Holden
Grzelcyk-Miller
He also missed four games last month because of a heart condition. Boston went 3-1-0 during that stretch of games.
--
Joey Alfieri is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @joeyalfieri.