Today was the first day back for the non-Olympian Pittsburgh Penguins who will take part in some practices to knock the rust off and get ready for the NHL’s return on February 26th. The Pens had two faces back on the ice with Kris Letang and Filip Hallander out with their teammates.
Letang suffered a fractured foot at the end of January and was said to be out for four weeks. Seeing him back on the ice now is a good sign that he’ll be ready to go when the games resume.
Advertisement
Hallander’s situation has been more fluid, suffering a blood clot from a puck strike in the leg back in early November. He has been able to do some workouts on his own but has been unable before today to participate in a team practice due to the three-month period while on blood thinners to treat the clot. There hasn’t been any official update on his status yet, though it sounds like good news that he was able to take the next step in his recovery.
The Pens still have four Olympians away from the team, Arturs Silovs won’t start today for Latvia in their upcoming quarterfinal game against Erik Karlsson, Rickard Rakell and Sweden. Sidney Crosby plays tomorrow for Canada.
The Penguins have another practice scheduled tomorrow at 11am and will put in some rink time almost daily over the next week as the players shake off the sand from their vacations and get ready to get back into the swing of the NHL schedule all over again later next week.
