What looked to be a short-term absence due to illness for Sabres winger Jason Zucker has now become a longer one. Matthew Fairburn of The Athletic notes ( Twitter link ) that the veteran hasn’t been able to eat solid food in nine days while battling the illness and has lost considerable weight as a result. Accordingly, he’s going to need a bit of a build-up from a conditioning standpoint once he’s able to eat again before he can be cleared to return. Zucker had been off to a solid start to his season before being sidelined, picking up four goals and three assists in a dozen games, providing the type of secondary scoring that Buffalo has been lacking for a while now.

Elsewhere around the NHL:

Stars winger Adam Erne will miss at least a couple of weeks due to a lower-body inju

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