Sam Bennett injured on Sunday night.

This is the last thing the Florida Panthers want to see this late into the regular season.

On Sunday night, Panthers forward Sam Bennett was shaken up in the third period of a clash between the Panthers and Pittsburgh Penguins when Penguins defenseman Matt Grzelcyk fired off a clearing attempt that went off the side of Bennett's knee.

The play appeared to be entirely accidental, with Grzelcyk seeing an opening to clear the puck down the ice only for Bennett to skate into the trajectory of that clearing attempt at the very last second. The end result was the puck taking a sickening bounce off of Bennett's knee, and Bennett himself crashing down to the ice in considerable pain.

Bennett is the kind of player who prides himself on being a pretty tough customer in the National Hockey League so you know for certain that he wasn't embellishing just how much this one hurt. The proud Panthers forward tried to get back to his feet with the help of his stick but would eventually need to be helped back to the Panthers bench where he would remain.

Some keen eyed observers noticed that Nico Sturm was filling in place of Bennett as the Panthers continued to play on, with Bennett appearing to be injured and unable to continue.

There is a silver lining here for the Panthers however as this appears like it will be a relatively short term situation. Following the conclusion of the game Panthers head coach Paul Maurice indicated that Bennett didn't feel good enough to play at the end of the game, but only expects him to be dealing with this ailment for a couple of days.

"It’s gonna take a couple of days," admitted Maurice. "Sam’s on the bike now, so he’s still 100%. Just some bruising that Sam just didn’t feel he had enough to put pressure on it and skate the way you would need to at the end of a game."