Canucks confirm that defenseman Filip Hronek is out long-term

UPDATE: The Vancouver Canucks have confirmed that defenseman Filip Hronek has undergone a lower body procedure and will be out of the team's lineup for approximately 8 weeks.

Read below for our earlier report on Hronek, published by Hockey Feed staff writer Jonathan Larrivee.

The Vancouver Canucks were given a scare earlier this week when Canucks defenseman Filip Hronek went awkwardly into the boards during Wednesday's loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins, the Penguins took that game by a score of 5-4, and unfortunately the first few updates coming out about that injury appear to be terrible for the Canucks.

The first news came courtesy of National Hockey League insider Elliotte Friedman who confirmed via his podcast on Friday that Hronek would miss significant time as a result of his recently sustained injury.

"There's no specific update but I've just heard that he's gonna miss some time," revealed Friedman on the 32 Thoughts podcast. "I don't know what the exact prognosis is... but I've just heard that he's gonna miss some time and that's obviously a huge loss for them."

That obviously didn't bode well for the Canucks and unfortunately it would seem as though the news only gets worse from there. Ben Kuzma of The Province has published an update of his own on the matter and, although Kuzma goes into more detail than Friedman, things sound even worse from his perspective.

From Kuzma:

The team was keeping mum on the status of the veteran blueliner, but the concern is about a possible separated shoulder after falling awkwardly into the end boards...

The big question now will be whether or not Hronek will need surgery to repair his damaged shoulder, something that will drastically impact how long he is going to be out for. A player can quickly recover, at least relatively speaking, from a separated shoulder that does not require surgery but that isn't the case when a surgical procedure is required. When going under the knife for a separated shoulder the timeline jumps from several weeks of recovery to several months, and that could prove to be catastrophic for the Canucks at this early stage of the regular season.

Stay tuned for more on this developing story.