Local reporters caught up with Michal Neuvirth after Monday’s practice at Kettler Iceplex. He tested his injured right foot – smacked by a shot during pregame warm-ups last Monday against Tampa Bay – and didn’t like what he felt, departing the ice about 15 minutes into the workout. That came after he went for over an hour on Saturday following the morning skate.
Neuvirth didn’t want to elaborate too much. He moved gingerly on Saturday, but felt okay. Monday? Different story. Saturday he could clearly drop into the butterfly without a problem. Pushing hard side to side with the explosiveness an NHL goalie needs was an issue, however.
“That’s the worst part, right? One thing is to do it when it’s a controlled situation. Then when it’s not and you have to like react [it hurts],” veteran goalie Tomas Vokoun said. “Is he probably could stand there and practice and go down and up? He probably could. But it doesn’t really make sense if it’s hurting you and you’re making it worse then you’re just extending your time in the long run. That kind of injury, I’ve never had it and it’s not common. So it’s kind of hard to project how long it’s going to bother you.”
So pushing things on Saturday maybe wasn’t the best idea. That’s something that comes with experience, according to Vokoun.
“Obviously, he’s frustrated because it’s kind of a bad injury [for goalies],” Vokoun said. “It’s nothing you ever really broken, you know what I mean? But it’s just because the skate squeezes your heel. So it’s giving him problems.”
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