Darcy Kuemper suffers freak injury in Game 3.

This is a very scary situation for Colorado Avalanche goaltender Darcy Kuemper and by extension the Colorado Avalanche.

On Saturday evening, Kuemper was injured when he suffered what appears to have been a freak injury when the stick blade of Nashville, Predators forward Ryan Johansson appears to have caught him right in the eye.

The Avalanche once again appeared to be in control during the game's opening period and would eventually close out the period with a 2 - 1 lead, but the story coming out of the first period will be surrounding the health and status of their goaltender. In the later stages of the period the aforementioned Johansson was involved in a battle in front of the net with Avalanche star forward Nathan MacKinnon and it was then that the injury to Kuemper would occur.

Johansson didn't even appear to be looking in Kuemper's general direction, instead watching the puck which was behind the net at the time, and may have in fact jammed his stick into Kuemper's mask as he was pushing back against an initial shove from MacKinnon. Even after he skated back to the bench Johansson appeared to be entirely oblivious of what he had done, but that won't lessen the severity of the injury to Kuemper.

The most concerning sign though would come when Kuemper would attempt to leave the ice as a result of the injury. The veteran netminder was clutching at his eye as he attempted to skate off, but appeared to become disoriented and collapsed to the ice in front of a National Hockey League official. Kuemper was eventually able to recover, get back to his feet, and walk back into the Avalanche locker room under his own power, but this may be a sign that he has been seriously injured as a result of this accident.

Here is a look at the replay:

Unsurprisingly, Kuemper would not return for the second period. It could very well be that both the Avalanche and the Predators will be forced to continue the series without their starting goaltenders.