Fabian Lysell’s first pro season ended in scary fashion, when he suffered a concussion and neck injury on a late, blindside hit to the head from Hartford Wolf Pack defenseman Adam Clendening during the Providence Bruins’ first-round playoff series.
Clendening got suspended three games, somehow reduced to two upon appeal. Lysell missed the rest of the series, which Providence lost, and had to delay his offseason training as the priority became his recovery.
Lysell, Boston’s 2021 first-round pick and current No. 1 prospect, is just now ramping back up to full speed two months later. He missed the first day of Bruins development camp this week because his neck stiffened up again while flying in and the team opted to play things as safe as possible. He returned to the ice on Tuesday and wore a red no-contact jersey for two days before finally shedding it and practicing in full on Thursday.
Appearing on WEEI’s Skate Podcast on Wednesday (listen to the full interview below), Lysell acknowledged that it was a little scary dealing with the effects of the concussion at times, but that he’s been feeling a lot better as this week has gone on.
“I feel way better right now,” he said. “We put a lot of work with my neck, because a lot of the stiffness is still up there. So, release that every morning and after that, I feel pretty good. So it's going in the right direction, and I'm pretty happy where I'm at right now. I feel like I can almost do 100 percent like I want to.”
While there was little Lysell could have done about the cheap shot that ended his season, he wasn’t particularly happy with how the second half of the year was trending even before that.
Lysell started his first pro season strong, recording 19 points in his first 20 AHL games. But then came the World Junior Championship in late December/early January. Lysell had zero points in seven games for Sweden, just four months after he had six points in seven games in the 2022 version of the tournament that was held in August due to a COVID delay.
By his own admission, he had hit a wall.
“I was like, pretty burnt out at that time,” Lysell said. “Already, by that time, I felt like I couldn't recover after like a practice or game and all that. So that put a lot of energy that when I was out there playing, I felt exhausted. So yeah, that might be a reason why it went like it went, but I'm not gonna sit here and put other things in front of that. I'm still a pro and I was not happy about the outcome of that tournament, but at the same time, it's a good learning experience and sometimes you're gonna have setbacks. It's all about bouncing back from those, so you learn from it too.”
Lysell tried to bounce back when he returned to Providence. There were times it looked like he was doing that well, like a six-game point streak at the start of February, but ultimately his second half was more inconsistent than his first half. He had 18 points over his final 34 games of the season – not exactly bad, but well below the nearly point-per-game pace he was scoring at through December.
Lysell said he struggled with rest and recovery, knowing where, when and how to conserve, recoup and build up energy. At times he couldn’t turn the switch “off,” and like a light bulb, eventually burned out. It’s an area where he thinks he’s learned a lot and can be a lot better this coming season. He wants to improve his strength and conditioning this summer as well, which also would certainly help with enduring the rigors of a pro season.
“For me, at least, it was very hard to cool down after a game,” he said. “After a while, that gets your energy less and less for a long period of time when you've been going for that long. … It was very hectic, and I haven't been that busy playing ever. So it's all about finding your ways to cool off when you can and then be on it when you can, because if you don't, then it's going to be a little bit like last year where my energy drains out after a while. So it's all about finding tools to reset.”
Where Lysell ends up this coming season remains to be seen. There is certainly more he can learn and work on in Providence, but with so much turnover among Boston’s forward group, there will also be an opportunity for him and other young players to compete for and potentially win NHL jobs.
As he prepares for his third training camp and preseason with the Bruins, Lysell has his eyes set on the big club.
“Of course. I think that should be everybody's goal coming into camp,” he said. “I'm no different. I really want to be on that team.”
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