Blue Jackets’ Miles Wood week-to-week with lower-body injury, placed on injured reserve
The Columbus Blue Jackets announced on Thursday that winger Miles Wood has been placed on injured reserve and will be out on a week-to-week basis due to a lower-body injury.
TRANSACTIONS: #CBJ have placed forward Miles Wood on Injured Reserve and recalled forward Danton Heinen from @monstershockey. Wood is considered week-to-week with a lower body injury suffered in last night's game vs. New Jersey. cbj.co/roster-tw-0101…
Wood sustained his injury midway through the first period of Wednesday’s 3-2 loss to his former team, the New Jersey Devils. Wood’s right skate got caught up with Ondrej Palat’s stick, which caused Wood to fall awkwardly into the boards, with his weight coming down on his left leg and knee. Wood favored that leg has he returned to the bench, and then he did not take another shift that game.
With Wood placed on IR, it means he will at least miss the next week of games against the Buffalo Sabres, Pittsburgh Penguins and San Jose Sharks before he is eligible to be activated back to the roster. However, given the nature of Wood’s timeline for return, it’s highly likely that he will remain on IR past the required one week.
Wood has already missed seven games this season, including one game to a lower-body injury last week. It’s not confirmed if his current injury is related to the previous lower-body injury, although it’s not likely since there is a clear cause for the current injury.
The injury is a blow to the season he had been having, as with eight goals and four assists for 12 points in 32 points, he was on pace to hit the 30-point mark over an 82-game season for the first time since the 2017-18 season, and the second time in his career. He was also scoring at a 20-goal pace, a mark that he’s never hit in his career.
With the roster space freed up by Wood’s IR placement, Danton Heinen has been recalled from the Blue Jackets’ AHL affiliate, the Cleveland Monsters. He had played just one game with Cleveland (with one assist in that game) after Columbus had acquired him from the Penguins as part of the return for Yegor Chinakov. Heinen also had a goal and an assist in the NHL with Pittsburgh, as well as six goals and 11 assists for 17 points in 12 games with their AHL affiliate, the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins.
The Blue Jackets currently sit in last place in the Metropolitan Division and the Eastern Conference with a 17-16-6 record, and are six points behind the Sabres for the final wild card spot in the East. They’ll look to bounce back from their loss to the Devils when they host the Sabres on Saturday at 3 p.m. EST.