New York Rangers News: Derek Stepan Has a Broken Jaw, Status Remains Unknown
Derek Stepan apparently broke his jaw last night after the hit he received from Brandon Prust, and is currently undergoing surgery.
According to Katie Strang of ESPN New York, Derek Stepan fractured his jaw last night as a result of the hit from Brandon Prust, and is currently in the process of having it surgically repaired. At this point, no one really knows if Stepan will be out long-term, or if he will be ready in time for game four on Sunday evening. It is worth noting that Stepan's initial X-rays came back negative last night, and further scans by a specialist revealed the fracture this morning.
I'm just going out a limb here by saying maybe the fracture was small enough to pass by the first set of x-rays, which is why the Rangers cleared him to return to last night's game. This whole situation is a little foggy at the moment, since we don't really have a ton of details, but one thing we do know is that it's very bad news for the Rangers. They were already missing Derick Brassard due to an undisclosed injury, and with him not being fully out of the woods just yet, the Rangers may have to look towards some of their call ups.
It's still mind boggling to think FOUR officials missed that blatant cheap shot at center ice last night. You had to figure with the way Prust acted after the Carey Price incident, there would be some sort of retribution. Do you recall Prust stating that they "won't run our goalie just because Kreider ran their's"?
Yeah, well, they just went after our number one center instead...
We will update this story as we hear more news on it.
