David Pastrnak's injury uncertainty leaves career-changing path for Bruins' prospect

David Pastrnak's injury is bad news for the Boston Bruins. It was a quiet ailment that many Bruins fans didn't even catch on Pastrnak's last shift against the New York Islanders. Boston's superstar was on the ice protecting a lead in the final minutes when he attempted to stride up ice for an empty net chance and seemingly felt something in his lower body.

Marco Sturm has been non-committal on making any comments about Pastrnak's injury. It seems he doesn't want to make any false promises to the fanbase, which is always bad news for timelines. With the team's leading point-getter not even skating since the injury last week, there's a good chance he is still a ways away.

If the Bruins are going to need to fill that hole left by Pastrnak in the long term, it's time that they put someone there who they can give the room to build confidence in that role. While no one wants to see Pastrnak hurt, it feels like the perfect time for the organization to provide Fabian Lysell his first real push at being a full-time NHLer.

David Pastrnak's injury uncertainty leaves career-changing path for Bruins' prospect

Lysell has been dealing with an injury over the past couple of weeks. The prospect left Providence Bruins practice early a couple of times, which had people scrambling to determine whether it was injury-related or part of a trade to give him a fresh start. It hasn't always been smooth-sailing for Lysell in Providence, and it felt like it might be time for him to go elsewhere.

The question was whether "elsewhere" was Boston or another organization. Most believed we had our answer when Georgii Merkulov received the recall to play in Pastrnak's first game out of the lineup, meaning he would be playing on his off-wing. It felt like an extra slap to the face of Lysell that Merkulov came up to play his off-wing instead of recalling Lysell to play the strong side.

It was an extra slap that Lysell had just scored two goals in his most recent game before that call-up. However, instead of cowering in the face of adversity, Lysell picked himself up and recorded four points in back-to-back games over the weekend, and then added another assist in Tuesday night's loss against Laval. He now has 12 points in his last 10 games.

The question I keep asking myself about this Lysell situation is: if not now, when? I understand that the organization worries about his all-around abilities, but if the skilled forward can't get a chance to replace Pastrnak for a couple of weeks, who isn't precisely a Selke-candidate himself, then when will Lysell ever get another chance?