FINLAND – Porin Assat received some devastating news as it found out that it will be without the services of Buffalo Sabres prospect, Joel Armia. Assat, already without its top goal scorer Tomas Zaborsky (shoulder), have had to battle the injury bug as well as a stomach virus. The stomach virus sidelined Aki Uusikartano and Tapio Sammalkangas from Monday’s matchup against JYP.
Joel Armia was Assat’s second highest goal scorer during the regular season. Armia was injured during Saturday’s game against JYP when he banged his knee whilst hitting JYP defenceman Sami Vatanen. After the hit, Armia was in the treatment room but returned to finish the game. Armia also played in Monday’s match.
He underwent further medical examinations on Tuesday that found further injury to the knee preventing him from playing. Armia will not require surgery to fix the damage, but will be sidelined for six weeks.
Assat are now without the services of its two top goal scorers who between them scored 53 goals in the regular season. Before the IIHF transfer deadline, Assat lost the services of Radek Smolenak to Pelicans, thus meaning that Assat are missing three players that combined for 67 goals.
Assat are down 3-0 in the best of seven series.
Further player losses were reported for KalPa who will be without the services of its number one net-minder, Mikko Koskinen. Koskinen will be suspended for one game for using his blocker to hit another player. The situation unfolded when Blues’ Tommi Huhtala drove to the net and crashed into Koskinen, without seemingly making any effort to stop. Huhtala will also miss the next clash between KalPa and Blues due to his antics. KalPa is currently up 3-0 in the series and will be looking to complete the sweep on the 28th of March.
Contact the author: janne.virtanen@prohockeynews.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/Amateur_hockey
You must be logged in to post a comment.