"I can only speak for myself, but I was gassed Thursday, from the morning all the way up until the start of the game," Zach Werenski said. "You have those nights when you play 82 games in a season, and some days, you don't feel it. It's unfortunate when the whole team feels that way because there's no blending in, but I feel like guys after yesterday having an optional and getting here and getting some rest, it seems like guys had more energy today. We were snapping pucks around, so I expect to have a lot more energy from our group tonight."
The bad news? The Blue Jackets lose another player, as Sean Kuraly went into COVID protocol and will have to miss the game. That opens up another big hole down the middle, as Kuraly joins Boone Jenner and Alexandre Texier as centers who are out, not to mention such names as Yegor Chinakhov and Joonas Korpisalo.
In other words, the Jackets are without some big players, with head coach Brad Larsen saying the team will have to lean even more into its leaders.
"If anything, they're more important to us now," he said. "When guys go down, those are the guys who have to step up. You call yourself a leader on the team, go lead and lead by our foundation. Show me the work, give me the work. We don't score and we don't run up the goals, that's fine, but you want to see effort every night.
"That's the important thing for our group. That can't fall off no matter how banged up are, who we're playing that night, what night that is, that has to be imperative for our group."
