Sens provide a big update on Anderson's injury

The Senators are coming off though back-to-back defeats. They were shutout 1-0 on Monday against the Columbus Blue Jackets, then they lost by a score of 2-1 at the hands of the Boston Bruins. Ahead of their longest and most demanding road trip of the season, the Sens face more bad news.

In the game against the Bruins, Craig Anderson was sidelined as precautionary measure. Today, D.J. Smith announced that Anderson was placed on the injury reserve.

The seasoned veteran has a disappointing record of 4-8-0 through 12 games tarted so far this season, although he has managed to keep a decent average of 2.96 goals against per game and a respectable .907 save percentage. Anderson is currently playing second fiddle to Anders Nilsson who is having a career-year so far with a record of 7-5-1, a GAA of 2.58 and a SV% of .927. 

That being said, Anderson has a lot of experience and logs in valuable minutes, his injury comes as a blow to the Sens. Ottawa will play 5 games on the road in 4 different time zones during a 10-day away streak, including 4 games in 5 days. 

Nilsson won't be able to start in each of those games, so coach Smith confirmed that 24 year old Marcus Hogberg who was called up from the Belleville Senators to be Nilsson's backup last Wednesday will start at least one of those games. "With some back-to-backs coming up and our roster situation, we've got to make sure that we have guys for this trip so Hogberg will come with us.", explained the Sens's head coach.

Hogberg's 6-6-0 record along with his 3.21 GAA and his .892 SV% in the AHL this season are not exactly great. However, Smith showed faith in the young goaltender. "I've said this all along but this is a process to see how many guys we can get to play better and be part of the future of this group and he's certainly part of it. He's played well as of late down there and he'll get his shot."

D.J. Smith also had some relatively good news regarding Anderson's situation. "We expect him to be back shortly thereafter so it's more precautionary.", said Smith. The subtext to his comments was that the 38 year old netminder could very well be back in the lineup during the road trip. Let's hope that Hogberg finds early success in the NHL, but Anderson's imminent return could be quite welcome.