Center sustained lower-body in second period favoring right leg after hit by McNabb

ST. LOUIS -- The St. Louis Blues have been virtually injury-free, as amazing as that sounds, during this 2023-24 season.

But they lost one of the guys they consider a heart-and-soul player.

Oskar Sundqvist went down in a heap and was in obvious pain, favoring his right leg while on the power-play of a 2-1 overtime loss against the Vegas Golden Knights on Monday.

Sundqvist was hit while retrieving a puck in the offensive zone corner boards by Vegas defenseman Brayden McNabb, his right leg hitting the boards hard and in obvious pain.

The center was favoring his right leg while being helped off the ice at the 9:50 mark of the second period. The Blues quickly announced that Sundqvist sustained a lower-body injury and would not return.

"I don't have an update, so I'll wait and see," Blues interim coach Drew Bannister said. "I'll probably have an update for you guys on Wednesday for that."

Sundqvist, who was a healthy scratch and missed his first game of the season last Thursday against the Ottawa Senators, has 21 points (six goals, 15 assists) in 70 games this season.

"He's a guy that brings everything every game for us," Blues captain Brayden Schenn said. 'He does the dirty work, goes to the front of the net and may not get rewarded all the time. He's a solid team guy and hopefully he's OK and hopefully get him back here soon."

Sundqvist recently signed a two-year, $3 million extension to remain in St. Louis, and the hope is it's not a knee injury that has been an issue for him in the past.

"Always tough. He's a heart and soul of this team, a warrior that brings it every single night," defenseman Torey Krug said. "You know what you're going to get out of him. Any time you see a guy like that go down, you feel for him. I think guys in the room were hoping it was nothing going to be serious and we were just trying to push to get a win for him tonight."

With 10 games left in the season, there's no telling what the extent of the injury is yet, but it could open the door for 2021 first-round pick Zach Dean to stick around and get some playing time, or perhaps Nikita Alexandrov gets in some games. Stay tuned.