Mike Sullivan offers up some injury updates on a number of Pittsburgh Penguins prior to tomorrow's home opener

With the season upon us, the Penguins would love to go into it with a healthy lineup of their starting players. Sullivan gave some updates on key players like Alex Nedeljkovic and Bryan Rust as well as others who have been sidelined.

Rust was on the ice today, practicing with a no contact jersey on. The Penguins would love to see Rust back and healthy for the season. It was reported that Rust was injured in the game against Columbus with an upper body injury.

Rust is a work horse for the Penguins and is the type of player they would love to have on the ice as sooon as possible. It is smart to take every precaution with him, as Kyle Dubas has said before,

Per Pens Inside Scoop, Mike Sullivan commented on the other Penguins who are injured. The good news is that all of them seem to be skating is some type of format.

Nedeljkovic has not been on the ice since getting hurt and taken out of the game against Detroit a couple of weeks back. Ned was scheduled to play the full game at the time and was replaced by Joel Blomqvist. Blomqvist will get to start the season on the Pittsburgh roster for the first time in his career. Last year with the WBS Penguins he played in 45 games, winning 25 of them with a 2.16 GAA and .921 SV%.

With hopefully two of the top guys out to start the season, we could be looking at a sooner return with them on the ice. Ponomarev and Nieto also joined Nedeljkovic on the ice for the injured skate, and Lizotte is still following protocol after suffering a concussion.

The Penguins fans are eager to get this year going and look forward to seeing their team get on the ice tomorrow night at PPG Paints Arean to host the Rangers in a season and home opener. For now, there does not seem to be any setbacks with injuries. Puck drops tomorrow at 7pm EST.