When Dallas Stars defenseman Patrik Nemeth was cut by an errant skate early in the first period of his team’s overtime loss on Saturday, even the Philadelphia Flyers bench was concerned.
Nemeth went down the tunnel immediately holding his arm, and word some came down that he would not be returning to the game. Replays showed one of R.J. Umberger’s skates coming up and slicing what appeared to be the soft side of Nemeth’s right wrist between the glove and elbow pad.
Here’s what the injury looked like on replay:
The best one could hope for was a superficial laceration of some sort, as there are all sorts of important things that run in that small little area. But Nemeth’s luck didn’t appear to be that good, and he will likely miss some significant time while recovering from the injury.
Conformation came via multiple places via Twitter, including Mike Heika.
Patrik Nemeth will be out for a good period of time, according to Lindy Ruff. Oleksiak steps in and someone will be called up from AHL.
— Mike Heika (@MikeHeika) October 19, 2014
The obvious replacement, veteran defenseman Sergei Gonchar, is not available. He is not yet skating after fracturing his ankle during training camp. The 6-foot-4, 233-pound Nemeth had a solid first four games for the Stars after joining the club for good at the end of last season.
Stars fans should find out soon which of the Texas Stars defensemen are called up to replace him, with Jyrki Jokipakka and John Klingberg being the most obvious candidates. The team has cap room to add the extra player to the roster because Rich Peverley was played on LTIR last weekend.