The Montreal Canadiens have announced that defenseman Arber Xhekaj is out for the rest of the season and will undergo shoulder surgery tomorrow. The 23-year-old hasn’t played in almost a week and will have his left shoulder operated on; the Canadiens believe he will be ready for training camp next season.
Xhekaj will finish his second NHL season with 44 games played and has tallied three goals and seven assists to go along with a +6 plus/minus. The native of Hamilton, Ontario saw his average ice time increase by about 40 seconds a game, and made some improvements to his defensive game, but still struggled with turnovers. The Canadiens did increase his powerplay ice time to roughly one minute per game, but he couldn’t capitalize on it and recorded no powerplay points this season.
In other Canadiens news, center Christian Dvorak will return to the lineup tonight for the first time since December 30th. The 28-year-old had surgery on January 5th to repair a torn pectoral muscle and will dress against the Philadelphia Flyers. It’s been a tough stretch for Dvorak as injuries and inconsistency have limited his impact this season as he has just three goals and four assists in 25 games. Dvorak was never an analytics darling but his underlying numbers have fallen off since joining the Canadiens three seasons ago.
Xhekaj is nothing more than a novelty.
You finally have something in common with an NHL player.
Out for the season is ”clickbait” a little bit, with 5-6 games to play, remainder of the season would be better.