Huge update on Brad Marchand

Earlier this offseason, Boston Bruins’ Brad Marchand underwent hip arthroscopy and labral repair on both hips. The procedures scared fans when it was first announced that the top forward was going under the knife, seeing that Marchand would miss significant time.

However on Thursday, at the 19th Annual Boston Bruins Foundation Golf Tournament, Marchand revealed that he will be back on the ice for a light skate on Friday at Warrior Ice Arena and is expected to return sometime after American Thanksgiving.

We felt it was important to specify, not to get fans excited that he could be back on the Canadian holiday and therefore in time for the regular season.

“I think it’s around there, the end of the month - the last few days of November is kind of the target date. It’s about six months, around there,” said Marchand, per NHL.com.

Marchand knows about the recovery for this type of injury: this is his second offseason surgery in the last two years, having also undergone a sports hernia repair in September 2020. Marchand did mention that this time around, the recovery has been much more intensive.

He chose to undergo the surgery knowing that he’d have some extra time for his recovery process after the Bruins were ousted in the first round of the postseason in May by the Carolina Hurricanes.

“And we finished earlier than we thought we were going to. I thought we were gonna make a further run last year, so I didn’t plan on doing it. When we finished early, it was a good time to do it. Camp’s a little bit later this year as well. Thought it made sense to do.”

While Marchand will get to jump back on the ice this week, he will need to be patient to get some real game action, he who has never missed more than 14 games in any of his 13 NHL campaigns.

However, he should get more than half of the season under his belt - with healthy hips - and the fuel going for a longer postseason this time around.