The Blues’ injury woes continue. The team has announced that they’ve placed forward Paul Stastny on the injured reserve with a lower-body injury. The veteran was injured following a collision with Maple Leafs forward Nazem Kadri on February 9th. Fortunately, Lou Korac of NHL.com tweets that the 31-year-old may only be out through the week.
The Blues will certainly miss the veteran, especially with fellow forwards Robby Fabbri and Kyle Brodziak sidelined with their own injuries. Coach Mike Yeo recently discussed Stastny’s importance to the team.
“He’s usually the first guy over the boards for a power-play face-off or the first guy over the boards for a penalty kill faceoff and those are key. He’s a very important player for us,” Yeo said. “You don’t take out a top-line center from too many lineups where they don’t feel that. It’s got to be a next-man-up mentality here. We have more than capable players and our focus is on the guys that are in the lineup and if we take care of our job, we give him a chance to get better and obviously we’ll be stronger when he gets back.”
In his third season with the squad, Stastny ranks fourth on the Blues in points (15 goals, 20 assists).