Canadiens shut down Weber
MONTREAL — The Montreal Canadiens’ demoralizing season went from bad to worse on Thursday.
The Canadiens announced that veteran defenceman Shea Weber will miss the rest of the season as he undergoes surgery for a torn tendon in his left foot. The 32-year-old has not played since Dec. 16.
Later in the day, Montreal also announced that goaltender Carey Price is sidelined indefinitely with a concussion. Price took a shot to the mask in Tuesday’s loss to the Philadelphia Flyers.
“It seems that everything that could have gone wrong this year, has,” said coach Claude Julien. “From the start of the season, and Price getting injured, and now Shea.”
Weber is believed to have been injured when he was hit by a shot in the opening game of the regular season. Julien said Weber played through the pain until he had to come out of the lineup. He skated in 20 of the first 21 games, took six games off, then played six more before going on the injured list for good.
Julien said keeping Weber in the lineup did not aggravate the injury and denied the team had mismanaged its star defenceman. He said shutting down Weber for the rest of the season was “the right thing to do.”
“What we tried to do was get him healed without surgery,” said Julien. “There was a good possibility that could happen. And that’s always the first option you take. But it didn’t work. Now’s the right time to do this, so that he’s 100 per cent before next year’s training camp.”