Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening! Welcome back to the Injury Ward. My name is Logan Clarkson and every Wednesday and Sunday I will be taking you through injury news and updates from around the NHL. I'll do my best to offer useful analysis and opinion as it relates to fantasy throughout. This week, I'm starting a small add-on called quarantine to the beginning of the article where I will list all players who are out with illness since there has been many such cases throughout the season. As always I’d like to thank every single one of you for reading. Now, on to the bad (and some good) news.

Quarantine List (i.e. out with an illness)

Cutter Gauthier / ANA, Damon Severson / CLB, Nicolas Hague / NSH, Jakob Chychrun / WSH

Injuries / Leaves

Tom Wilson / Washington Capitals – Wilson (lower body) might be able to return Thursday versus San Jose, per Sammi Silber of The Hockey News. Wilson was initially feared to be missing a decent stretch since the injury looked pretty bad on first viewing. Apparently though, Tom Wilson is made of high strength steel; not that we didn't already suspect it since cannonballs usually are. Wilson has missed a total of five games so far, and was in the process of an eight-points-in-four-games streak before being taken down. He's having a career year at 1.02 PTS/g which allowed him to be named to Team Canada's roster for the Milan Olympics, though he may have been selected anyways to match the American's Tkachuk turbulence.

Miro Heiskanen / Dallas Stars – Heiskanen (personal) is away from the team to tend to a family matter and did not play Tuesday versus the Ducks. Miro is back to producing on the powerplay and even strength this season, when things were looking the most dire for him, including the coming out party for Thomas Harley last year. Heiskanen coming into the season was even talked about to lose the powerplay to Harley, and after an early season injury and very hot start for Harley in those minutes he left him it seemed to be written in the ancient texts. But fear not, because Harley has nearly completely fallen off, and Miro has almost returned to his breakout offensive form of three years ago. With 0.78 PPG this season, it's his best looking numbers since 2022-23 when he was nearly a point per game player (0.98 PPG). Still a ways to go in order to reach his true potential, but he's no longer being talked about as just a great player on the ice, sliding his way back into fantasy potential.

Troy Terry / Anaheim Ducks – Terry (upper body) has very much been the straw stirring the umbrella topped drink in California this year. Watching the guy, you could always sense that he had more to give offensively since he came into the league and was always just waiting for the team to put some talent around him in order to realize that full potential. Well, it's his eighth year in the league and he's finally received that kind of talented support that he's longed for. Troy has 42 points in 43 games so far this year, and has done so with linemates such as Leo Carlsson, Cutter Gauthier, Chris Kreider, and Mikael Granlund. It's always great to see guys with this sort of potential get the help they need and turn in career years.

Leo Carlsson / Anaheim Ducks – Carlsson (lower body) won’t play Friday versus the Stars. It may benefit Carlsson's fantasy owners to see him get a bit of a break here, since he has fallen off in his point production quite steeply over the past month. In Leo's first 21 games, he put up an amazing 28 points. In his next 23 though, he managed to make the score sheet just 15 times. The second part of those totals isn't actually terrible when you look at his PPG of past seasons, but when you factor in just how hot he came out of the gates and the fact that he actually led the league at one point, it's tough to swallow for his owners who initially struck oil while digging a pool in their backyards.

Brayden Point / Tampa Bay Lightning – Point (lower body) is week-to-week, per Lightning play-by-by announcer Dave Randorf on Tuesday. Point had disappointed his owners for months coming in at just 11 points and 44 SOG over his first 20 games played. Especially when you saw the rest of the Lightning line up continuing on with their own lofty totals, Kucherov leading the way. Just when Brayden had begun to turn a corner in his production (19 PTS in 17 GP), he gets twisted up in front of the goal immediately after scoring another goal, and goes down with a full-grown man on his leg. Point's Olympic hopes may very well be dashed, and you have to feel for the guy. With the lowered point production, came a very low shooting %, and a lowered SOG/G leading myself to believe he was dealing with an upper body injury to begin with all season. 

Adin Hill / Vegas Golden Knights – Hill (lower body) won’t play in Wednesday’s road matchup against the Kings, but he is nearing a return to the lineup, per SinBin Vegas on Tuesday. Hill soon returns to a goalie lineup that includes Akira Schmid, who has been starting a good chunk of games lately and not performing amazingly while doing so. Carter Hart is the other part of the Vegas duo currently, and has also been quite stinky back there. Their goalies don't face a lot of shots but still manage to let in a few a game usually so if you're in need of SV%, you may want to look elsewhere. It's anybody’s guess which two goalies end up on the roster at the end of season, but Adin Hill will be there with one of them.

Erik Karlsson / Pittsburgh Penguins – Karlsson was placed on injured reserve Tuesday with a lower-body injury. Per Seth Rorabaugh of Tribune-Review Sports, Karlsson will be out of action for at least two weeks. Karlsson had been enjoying a great second quarter of the season, having 20 points and 58 SOG in his last 25 games. It was a bit of a resurgence for the man, who before his Achilles injury in 2013 was looking to be one of the best offensive defenseman of all time. Amazingly, he has still been an insanely good player regardless of being winged so early on and went on to produce 1.23 PPG just four years ago in San Jose. Hats off to the man.

Will Smith / San Jose Sharks – Head coach Ryan Warsofsky said Monday that Smith (upper body) is considered day-to-day, Max Miller of NHL.com reports. Warsofsky has since said that Smith practiced with contact Wednesday but won’t play vs. the Capitals tomorrow. He also was not sure if he will play Friday in Detroit. 

Thatcher Demko / Vancouver Canucks – Demko (undisclosed) is enigmatic to say the least. Since being put on IR this week, Adam Foote was asked about him being shut down for the season and all he had to say was maybe, and that he has a few things going on. Just a disaster for the Canucks this season all around. The decision to start Demko four games in a row in late December puzzled me coming off injury, and now it makes me look like the smartest person in western Canada when I’m light years away from being the smartest person in the room at any given time. Not a good look for the franchise lately, and you have to feel for their fans with seemingly no concrete direction forward being taken by them.

Thanks again for reading, and please give me a follow, you can find me here on Twitter/X @LOGoalz for any questions, concerns, or abuse you may want to shower me with. Have a great week people!