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Even more injuries than expected affected many Penguins late in playoffs

Pittsburgh Penguins goalies Marc-Andre Fleury, left, and Matt Murray hoist the Stanley Cup on stage after riding in the team's NHL hockey Stanley Cup victory parade in Pittsburgh, Wednesday, June 14, 2017. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)

PITTSBURGH POST GAZETTE via AP

PITTSBURGH- After months of speaking about their injuries in vague generalities and approximate body areas, Penguins players were finally able to get specific Thursday morning at their team locker clean-out.

The result is exactly as you’d expect: This was one injured team by the end of the playoff run.

“We’re a banged-up group right now,” coach Mike Sullivan said. “We had guys playing with broken bones, broken ribs. These guys have such an appetite to win and be a part of it, they’re willing to play through so much.”

Goalie Matt Murray didn’t break any bones, but the injury that kept him out for the first two rounds of the playoffs wasn’t any less painful.

Murray said Thursday he tore his hamstring during warmups before Game 1 against Columbus, keeping him out until he returned as Marc-Andre Fleury’s backup in Game 7 against the Capitals.

“It could’ve been something prior to that, but I felt it go in that warmup,” Murray said.

“I was just thinking about what I needed to do to get back and that’s kind of what I focused on. I think I got back pretty quickly and I think I came back stronger that I did before. That was a positive out of it.”

There were, though, some literal broken bones during this playoff run. Winger Carl Hagelin revealed that he had broken his fibula March 8 against Winnipeg, and it didn’t heal correctly during his time off.

When he went out of the lineup, the initial estimation was that he’d be out four to six weeks.

“After five weeks, there wasn’t much healing in there,” Hagelin said.

By that point, the Penguins were into the second round of the playoffs against Washington, and Hagelin was willing to do whatever it took to get back on the ice. Oddly enough, he said, getting back into action and getting some blood flowing through his leg ended up helping his injury heal in the long run. Still, it wasn’t exactly an enjoyable process.

“It wasn’t until probably the Nashville series where I actually felt like I could do what I wanted, my leg felt somewhat normal,” Hagelin said.

Nick Bonino’s leg felt anything but normal by the end of the final, after he broke his tibia blocking a P.K. Subban slap shot in Game 2. Bonino, amazingly, returned in that Game to play the second and third period, even though he missed the last four games of the final.

“Just modern medicine,” Bonino said. “I think they poked me a lot down there and shot it up. At the end of the day you can’t really feel it, but you don’t have great balance, you don’t have great pop, great push-off. And even if I could’ve played like I did at practice, I was moving around OK, but at the end of the day I probably wouldn’t have helped the team that much.”

The good news for Bonino and the Penguins is that he – like the rest of his injured teammates – won’t need surgery to correct the issue.

The bad news?

“I can’t walk and I can’t golf right now, so that’s the worst,” Bonino said.

As for the broken ribs Sullivan referred to, those belonged to defense partners Justin Schultz and Ian Cole. Schultz said he fractured a rib in Game 2 against Ottawa, causing him to miss the next four games. Cole did not miss any games, playing with a broken rib and a broken hand.

“I think rest will be good,” Cole said. “Any injury I have should get better with rest and time off, not getting run through the boards anymore. That’ll be good. We’re going to take a couple of weeks off, try and let the body recover and it’s right back at it.”

Fellow defenseman Brian Dumoulin also said he injured his hand “pretty good” in Game 5 against Columbus (he didn’t specify the injury) but played all 25 postseason games.

“It didn’t seem to heal throughout the playoffs at all,” Dumoulin said. “It’s good now to give it some rest and figure out what’s going on with it.”

Bryan Rust and Phil Kessel both said they had some general bumps and bruises, but declined to specify any single injury.

Not every player spoke at the locker clean-out, either, so there’s a good chance there are more injury revelations still to come. It’s clear, though, that the Penguins’ training room was a busy place over the last few weeks of the postseason.

“A lot of times, we’re trying to protect our players through the playoff process, so we don’t always come out and tell the media or the people what they’re playing with for obvious reasons,” Sullivan said. “But I just have so much respect for what this group of players has endured in order to win this Stanley Cup championship.”

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