The Buffalo Sabres are dealing with another significant injury at this time. This time it is to defenseman Mattias Samuelsson of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, who is out for the season with an injury. All we know at this time it is an upper-body injury. A week ago it was reported that Sabres forward Jack Quinn would be out long term with a lower body injury.
How did the injury occur?
There are conflicting reports when the injury happened. Samuelsson initially left the Sabres game on January 13 against the Vancouver Canucks. In a 1-0 Sabres loss to Vancouver, he was a recipient of an elbow to the head from an incident with the Canucks defenseman Filip Hronek of Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic. However, according to to Heather Engel of nhl.com, there is a belief that Samuelsson suffered the injury in the Sabres’s 4-2 loss to the Anaheim Ducks on January 23. It should be noted that Samuelsson did play the Sabres’s game against the Tampa Bay Lightning in between the Sabres’s game against the Canucks and Ducks. He was on the ice for 26 shifts (20 minutes and 18 seconds of ice time) in a 3-1 Sabres loss.
Samuelsson’s 2023-24 Statistics
Samuelsson had one goal and six assists for seven points in 41 games. He was a +4 with 26 penalty minutes, one game-winning goal, 44 shots on goal, 86 blocked shots, 83 hits, eight takeaways, and 24 giveaways. The game-winning goal, his first of his NHL career, came in a 3-1 Sabres win over the New York Islanders on October 21. Samuelsson scored from Casey Mittlestadt of Eden Prairie, Minnesota and Jeff Skinner of Toronto, Ontario. At the time, the Sabres went up 2-0 with 37 seconds left in the second period.
Samuelsson’s 2022-23 Statistics
Last season Samuelsson had two goals and eight assists for 10 points in 55 games. He was a +14 with 20 penalty minutes, one shorthanded point, 76 shots on goal, 91 blocked shots, 107 hits, 21 takeaways and 21 giveaways. The shorthanded point was the first of Samuelsson’s career, and was a shorthanded assist on a game-winning goal by Kyle Okposo of St. Paul, Minnesota in a 5-3 Sabres win over the Nashville Predators on January 14, 2023. The goal came at 6:43 of the third period and put the Sabres up 4-3 at the time.
Son of Kjell Samuelsson
Mattias Samuelsson is the son of former NHL defenseman Kjell Samuelsson. A native of Tingsryd, Sweden, Kjell Samuelsson played 14 seasons in the NHL with the New York Rangers, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins and Tampa Bay Lightning from 1985 to 1999.
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