Everyone's favorite hockey writer Fluto Shinzawa (guy's great if you don't regularly check out his work) has a couple of injury updates for the Black and Gold, so let's take a look:

First, the good: Patrice Bergeron says he's "very confident" he'll return to play this year. For the first time since Dec. 20, when he suffered a concussion against Carolina, Berg says he's headache-free and able to work out without any negative symptoms. It's encouraging news, especially considering the grim diagnosis last year around this time. Hopefully Berg can come back and just get back into the swing of things; it still remains to be seen whether he can be as effective as he was before these concussions (we've seen numerous times that players are often not close to the same after suffering such serious injuries with such disturbing frequency), but there's no doubt the B's are a better team with him on the ice. I don't care if he puts up All-Star numbers after returning, I'll just be happy to see him return and stay on the ice in the first place.

Falling under the "you take the good news with the bad" category, Marco Sturm will have knee surgery next week and is expected to miss the rest of the season. The meniscus in Sturm's left knee needs to be repaired, perhaps along with the ACL. The organization will look to fill his absence from within (been working so far this season...), and if that doesn't work, a trade may follow. It sucks to lose anyone of Sturm's stature for the season, but last year's leading goal scorer (27) and runner up in total points (56) has been largely ineffective  in limited action (7 goals and 6 assists in 19 games), and the B's have actually look to have good enough depth (for the first time in years) to replace him in the long run.