NHL-Penguins captain Crosby sidelined for four weeks after Olympics injury

Feb 25 (Reuters) – Pittsburgh Penguins captain Sidney Crosby will be out at least four weeks due to a lower-body injury suffered while playing for Canada at the Winter Olympics, the NHL team said on Wednesday.

Crosby, one of the game’s best players who scored the winning goal for Canada in overtime in the 2010 Vancouver Games final and went on to captain his country to a second successive Olympic title in Sochi four years later, suffered the injury during the quarter-finals in Milan last Wednesday.

The 38-year-old Crosby left the ice gingerly in the second period after colliding with Czech defenceman Radko Gudas and did not return.

Crosby missed Canada’s semi-final win over Finland and was not in the lineup for the overtime loss to the United States in the final but was on the ice in full uniform for the medal presentation.

It was the first Olympics to feature NHL players since the 2014 edition. A number of factors had kept the NHL from sending players to the Olympics, including player-related costs such as insurance, travel and accommodations, along with concerns over schedule disruption, player injury risk and the pandemic.

Crosby, who was taken with the first pick of the 2005 NHL Draft by the Penguins, is a three-time Stanley Cup champion who has won the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP twice and the Hart Trophy as NHL MVP twice.

(Reporting by Frank Pingue in Toronto, editing by Ed Osmond)