Colton Pankiw
Kevin Labanc can relate to William Eklund.
Just last season, the long-time San Jose Sharks winger also suffered a major shoulder injury which required surgery and ended his season prematurely.
For those unaware, it was recently announced that Eklund will be out for the remainder of the 2022-23 season after undergoing shoulder surgery. It will be a long recovery process for the 20-year-old — Labanc dislocated his shoulder in Dec. 2021 and wasn’t ready for full-contact hockey until the summer — but having someone like Labanc who went through the same thing could prove to be very helpful for the Sharks prospect. Labanc says that while he has not yet spoken with Eklund, he hopes to in the near future.
So what advice does Labanc have for Eklund?
“If you do it right, you’re going to feel better and come back stronger than you did before the surgery,” Labanc said. “It’s tough, but the facilities in San Jose are incredible, and our PT guy, Ross [Nakaji], he’s incredible as well. He does such an incredible job and it really makes the recovery that much quicker, I think.”
While Labanc has now had plenty of time to fully recover from his operation, it wasn’t an overnight fix. In fact, he had to sit out extra time than initially planned to be sure he was 110 percent healed. In Mar. 2022, three months after his surgery, he started practicing, and there was some hope that he could return for the end of the 2021-22 campaign. But in the end, he and the San Jose Sharks decided to shut it down.
So he understands that Eklund will want to get back to doing what he does as soon as possible, but stressed that taking the time to properly recover is crucial.
“Don’t push it if you don’t need to,” Labanc said. “This takes a little bit of time and you’ve got to be careful. You’re going to have some good days, some bad days, but you want to make sure that if it heals, it heals right, and that there’s no outliers during the healing process. I’m sure that he’s going to come back stronger than ever and he’s going to be ready to go. It’s just going to be doing what the doctor says, what the PT guy says to make sure that shoulder’s nice and strong.
“You see guys like [Max] Pacioretty, maybe if he took a week, maybe a bit longer, who knows? He might not be out for as long. You just need time. You just need to take time with these things.”
Pacioretty, unfortunately, had a second Achilles tear in January, roughly a week after returning from the same injury suffered over the summer. While it’s impossible to know whether or not a quick return played a part, it suggests how important it is that Eklund makes sure to be fully healed before returning to game action.
The silver lining for Eklund is that his injury came near the end of the season, rather than Labanc’s which occurred mid-season. While the San Jose Sharks prospect will miss some development that can occur over the summer, he is expected to be ready to go by training camp in September. By that time, the young Swedish forward should have had some time to get back into the gym and be ready to play games, if is timeline is anywhere similar to Labanc’s.
“I think once I hit like two and a half months, three months, that’s when you can start doing shoulder stuff. You just start strengthening it. It’s a phase, like first phase getting your mobility back. Second phase is get a lot of strength, and third phase is making sure you can bump around into people and can get hit.
“It all just depends on how your body heals. As soon as I found out all my [fitness] numbers…Bench, everything, once I got there, I was on the ice hitting. I was physical, then I felt I was ready and this [shoulder’s] not moving.”
Assuming Eklund follows a similar timeline, he should be able to get back into the gym doing upper-body exercises around July. Until that time, however, Labanc says there are other things Eklund can do to ensure he is staying in shape.
“For me, I was riding the bike every single day. I couldn’t really do much else, but that’s what helps you stay in shape and keeps your stamina up. It’s not easy, it was tough, but you’ve got to do it. Everyone goes through these injuries.”
It certainly won’t be easy and is an injury no one wanted to happen, but a player with Eklund’s drive and determination should have no problem making a full recovery. This may very well serve as extra motivation for him to make next year’s Sharks roster out of training camp.