After missing ten games with a lower-body injury, Joseph will suit up in Calgary Tuesday night.
On Tuesday night, the Ottawa Senators will get one of their most valuable players back in the lineup. Mathieu Joseph has been activated from long-term injured reserve. He's missed the past ten games with a lower-body injury he suffered on December 15th against the Dallas Stars.
With Joseph back in the lineup, it's someone else's turn to play, "Let's get cap relief by putting someone on long-term injured reserve." Injured centre Rourke Chartier now gets a turn, being moved to LTIR. That gets Ottawa to exactly $0 in cap space.
Joseph has 19 points in 25 games this season, stands sixth in ice time among Sens forwards, and leads the club with a +12. Joseph sounds like a player who's confident in his role.
"I just gotta hunt pucks," Joseph told the media after Monday's practice. "I just need to pay well defensively, do my job, and finish the game feeling like I had an impact on both sides of the ice."
Joseph is precisely the kind of hard-working, two-way player that head coach Jacques Martin likes to lean on. Even though this will be his debut under Martin, Joseph will roll back into the lineup on one of the top two lines. Based on how the lines looked at practice on Monday, Joseph will likely be skating on the right side Tuesday night with Josh Norris and Brady Tkachuk.
Martin has been here long enough to see the before and after effects of Joseph's injury. Since the speedy winger got hurt, the Senators have gone 3-7. The skid has many layers to it, but Joseph's absence definitely hasn't helped.