2023-10-02 00:05:07
The news broke with the season just around the corner, Andrei Vasilevskiy He is expected to miss the first two months of the season after undergoing back surgery. A more than considerable loss, since the Russian goalkeeper is one of the most outstanding in the league and one of those responsible for Tampa Bay Lightning has been an outstanding team in recent NHL seasons.
The player already reported in August that he was suffering from back discomfort, but that improved after an injection. But the arrival of the first training session of the season reawakened these discomforts.
Discomfort that resulted from a herniated disc that was the subject of the surgical operation and that will leave the ownership of the Bolts’ goal vacant at the start of the league.
Losing a goalie like Vasilevskiy hurts any team, but in the case of the Bolts, the damage is greater, since it is one of the few goalkeepers who is capable of taking the ice in at least 60 games and all the playoff rounds that are necessary.
The Bolts’ options
Obviously everyone is wondering how management will deal with this situation, and Julien BriseBois He has made it clear that he will use the goalkeepers available in the team’s current squad, Jonas Johansson y Matt Tomkins.
The Swede was acquired last summer as a substitute, a role that he has played in the various franchises he has previously been through with more or less prolonged periods in their AHL affiliates. With 35 games, he is the most experienced goalkeeper on the North Florida squad..
Jonas Johansson | Photo: NHL.com
Tomkins, whose biggest milestone is playing for Canada in the last Olympic tournament, has spent the last two years playing in Sweden. His experience in North American professional hockey is limited to the AHL and the ECHL, the second and third rungs of the professional hockey pyramid, so his NHL service record is completely blank today.
Despite these intentions shown, Facing these two months with these players does not seem like a probable scenarioand it would be necessary to search carefully among the free agents who remain unsigned or find a goalkeeper that another team places on waivers and claim him.
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