The Ottawa Senators announced that center Josh Norris would not be returning to Tuesday’s game against the Nashville Predators due to an upper-body injury.
Norris, 24, left the game midway through the second period after an attempted hit on Cole Smith resulted in Oxford, Michigan product falling into the back of the net and hitting the post in the middle of the net. He skated off the ice by his own ability, but was clutching his arm.
There’s currently no further details of Norris’ injury, more specifically on if it’s another injury to his shoulder. He missed 16 games in 2021-22 and 74 games in 2022-23 due to shoulder injuries.
Norris leaves the game with two hits in 6:30 of ice time, with the Senators down 2-1 at the time of his departure.
Norris has had a bit of an underwhelming season for the Sens, as he only has 16 goals and 14 assists for 30 points in 50 games. Assuming his injury doesn’t keep him out of the lineup, he’d be on pace for just 45 points this year, which would be 10 less than his breakout 2021-22 season that came in just 66 games.
Norris was the 19th-overall pick of the San Jose Sharks in the 2017 NHL Draft, although he never played a game for their NHL or AHL squad, as he was dealt to the Sens halfway through his college career as part of the return in the Erik Karlsson trade in 2018. He made his NHL debut in the 2019-20 season for a three game stint and has since gone on to spend the past four seasons at the NHL-level with the Sens.
Norris is currently in the second year of an eight-year contract with a $7.95 million cap hit, one he signed as a restricted free agent in the 2022 offseason.
Heading into Tuesday’s game, the Senators sat in last in the Atlantic Division with an 25-28-3 record, which is the sixth-worst record in the league and 16 points behind the Tampa Bay Lightning for the final wild card spot in the Eastern Conference.
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