The Tampa Bay Lightning had just had their roster replenished, with Jonathan Drouin and Cedric Paquette returning from injury in the last couple of games, but it wasn’t to last.
Ondrej Palat left Saturday night’s game against the Minnesota Wild in the second period, being assisted off the ice and seeming to favor his right leg. From the GIF provided by @myregularface, it appears that Nino Niederreiter landed on the lower half of his leg in traffic happening around the Lightning’s net.
Palat just had to be helped to the locker room pic.twitter.com/bLJMq2usZP
— Stephanie (@myregularface) November 8, 2015
It was announced at the start of the third period that Palat would not return to the game with a lower body injury.
Ondrej Palat has sustained a lower body injury and will not return to tonight’s game. #TBLvsMIN
— Tampa Bay Lightning (@TBLightning) November 8, 2015
While there is no official update from the club yet on what the exact injury is, after the game Joe Smith with the Tampa Bay Times reported that Head Coach Jon Cooper said that the injury “didn’t look good” and that there is a concern that Palat will be more than day-to-day.
The Lightning have been bit hard by the injury bug this year, sitting at 7th in the league in Injured Man Games Lost as of Saturday morning with 42. So far this season Palat has two goals and five assists, tying him for fifth in point for the Bolts. Losing him for an extended period of time is something no one wants to see and the last thing the struggling-to-score club needs.
