Crushing Blow to the Sens

If you were watching tonight's Penguins-Senators game, chances are you saw that bad cut on Erik Karlsson's Achilles. And chances are you wish you never saw it.

But unfortunately it did.

Erik Karlsson will need surgery to repair his left Achilles after taking a cut by a skate blade late in the second period. The Norris Trophy winner last season for being the NHL's top defenseman, he was cut by Penguins forward Matt Cooke's skate blades as they were tangling along the boards.

Karlsson fell to the ice and was clearly in pain. He needed help to get back to the bench and his frustration let it lose, as he threw his sticks against the boards before disappearing down towards the locker rooms.

"You knew right away there was an issue," Senators goalie Craig Anderson said. "He's a player who is irreplaceable. It's unfortunate, but there are no words that can explain what we're feeling."

You may recall that Matt Cooke has been suspended several times for hits, a lot of them involving head shots that injured opposing players. Back in 2011, Cooke was suspended for the final 10 regular-season games and the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs for elbowing the head of Rangers defenseman Ryan McDonagh. Since then, Cooke has worked on toning down his game since then.

This injury is just another major blow to an already-depleted Senators team. No. 1 center Jason Spezza was lost to back surgery earlier this season. Forward Milan Michalek did miss Wednesday's game with a lower-body injury and these type of injuries just prove to drag a team down. Earlier today, I told you about the Avs' injury problems. Well, let's just say the Senators are the Avalance of the Eastern Conference. They're having trouble keeping up because plenty of their players keep getting hurt. I don't expect Erik Karlsson to return anytime soon, so the Sens need to make patches in their defense just so that they compete with the other teams in the Eastern Conference. If not, they'll need to make a trade to shore up their defense. Without Erik Karlsson, however, I don't expect a whole lot of help for Craig Anderson on the defense. He'll need to come up big at times in order to keep the Sens in the game.

Thoughts and prayers go out to Erik Karlsson and we all hope that he has a quick recovery from his surgery and he is able to get back onto the ice. Because if you saw it, and I did, it didn't look good at all. And now the Sens will have to find out how they can improve their defense and be able to keep winning games.