Montreal Canadiens: Ryan Poehling one of few dealing with playoff injuries
The playoffs have begun for Montreal Canadiens prospects, and unfortunately, some have run into injuries including Ryan Poehling, Alexander Romanov, Jacob Olofsson and Jesse Ylönen.
Injuries are part of the game, and it’s up to any team to ensure their club is in the best shape to deal with any of them. However, for powerhouses in any league, the regular season is only practice and preparation for the playoffs and losing players then is tough to overcome, especially when the ailing are your key contributors. The Montreal Canadiens have had their fair share of injuries this season, but luckily the playoffs haven’t started yet. The same can’t be said for a number of their prospects unfortunately who have found themselves on the sidelines.
Ryan Poehling, Alexander Romanov, Jacob Olofsson and Jesse Ylönen are all day-to-day with an injury.
Poehling left in the first period of St. Cloud State’s NCHC semi-final game against Colorado College. While skating backwards, the 20-year-old tripped up and collided with the boards hard. Most of it was body contact, but his head was involved in the accident as well.
St. Cloud went on to win the game to move on, but it looked as if they would need to continue on without Poehling as he was ruled out of their next match against Minnesota-Duluth. It took double overtime but unfortunately, St. Cloud lost the game in a 3-2 decision.
As for Poehling, Chris Peters of CBS Sports tweeted that he was day-to-day and would be evaluated. Their next game is Friday against American International but who knows whether the 2017 first-round pick will be healthy enough to play.
St. Cloud State Brett Larson tells @ESPN_Schick that Ryan Poehling (MTL) is day-to-day and will be reevaluated tomorrow. Not a lot of new information and I don't know how much we'll get before the regional.
— Chris Peters (@chrismpeters) March 24, 2019
Romanov played in all four games of CSKA Moscow’s first-round sweep over Vityaz. However, he’s been a healthy scratch in the second round which went to five games being absent from all of them. We finally got some information on what was going on via Andrew Zadarnowski of Habs Eyes on the Prize who tweeted that Romanov has been dealing with an injury himself.
Alexander Romanov is dealing with an injury, which explains why he has not been playing for CSKA recently in the KHL playoffs.
— Andrew Zadarnowski (@AZadarski) March 25, 2019
We also have Ylönen who was ready to start the playoffs with the Pelicans after a decent rookie season putting up 13 goals and 14 assists in 53 games. That had to be cut short as well with the 2018 second-round pick falling to injury during the opening round game against
Some work along the boards saw Ylönen take a check from behind knocking him over and head and shoulder-first into the boards. The Pelicans have played two more games since and Ylönen has yet to return.
Olofsson completes the Habs second-round as far as injured prospects from 2018. He’s been out of the lineup since February 21st with a knee injury and put up three goals and six assists in 34 games before that. Timrå HK begins their series against Oskarshamn on Wednesday and it doesn’t look like Olofsson will be ready for it, but hopefully, that changes at some point in the post-season.
Tough breaks all around the board, but especially for Poehling as it looked as if this would be his final year playing in St. Cloud. Perhaps the injury isn’t as bad as it seems and he heals quickly.
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