The Sharks officially placed Timothy Liljegren on injured reserve, a day after the defenseman was listed as day-to-day with an upper-body injury, according to Curtis Pashelka of the Bay Area News Group. There’s no corresponding recall coming immediately, Pashelka reports.
Liljegren got banged up in Tuesday’s 5-1 drubbing at the hands of the Hurricanes, landing awkwardly after a failed board battle with Carolina’s Taylor Hall (video via JD Young of Locked On Sharks). That means he’s been ruled out for San Jose’s next two games and will be eligible to come off IR for their game against the Islanders next Tuesday.
The 26-year-old Swede has played in all three games for the Sharks to start the year after being the subject of trade rumors over the offseason, operating as their top right-shot defender. He’s averaging a career-high 20:14 per game, seeing the second-most time at even strength behind Nick Leddy and forming half of the defense pairing on their top penalty-killing unit with Mario Ferraro. He hasn’t gotten on the scoresheet yet, though. He has a -2 rating with 10 blocks and three hits. The Sharks have been shelled in Liljegren’s 5-on-5 minutes, losing the shot attempt battle 70-33 for a CF% of 32.0. While that looks drastic, the Sharks have posted a horrid 33.5 CF% at even strength through three games, so he hasn’t dipped too far below the team average despite being deployed primarily as a defensive specialist to begin the year.
It’s not surprising to see San Jose not rush to make a corresponding recall. They still have seven defensemen on the active roster after starting the year with eight of them. One of those seven is John Klingberg, who was also ruled day-to-day by head coach Ryan Warsofsky yesterday, but he hasn’t yet been ruled out for tomorrow’s contest against the Mammoth. However, he wasn’t taking line rushes yesterday, indicating he could still sit out as a precaution while veteran righty Vincent Desharnais makes his season debut after being scratched for the Sharks’ first three games.
There’s no indication as of yet that Liljegren’s absence should last much longer than the retroactive seven days required for an IR placement. In the meantime, it’ll be a good opportunity for Desharnais to shake off the rust, as well as for rookie Sam Dickinson to push for more minutes after averaging just 11:56 through his first two NHL appearances.