Bruins’ Joe Sacco Offers Encouraging Update On Hampus Lindholm

The Bruins officially moved Hampus Lindholm to long-term injury reserve on Tuesday before Boston hosted the Tampa Bay Lightning at TD Garden.

However, the key defenseman has taken steps toward recovery from a lower-body injury that has kept him sidelined since Nov. 12.

“No setback. Hampus is making good progress,” Bruins interim head coach Joe Sacco told reporters after morning skate on Tuesday, per team-provided video. “He’s skating with (skating and skills coach) John McLean right now. The next step will be for him to join us, maybe for portions of our practice, maybe the beginning of practice, whenever that time is. But he’s making good progress still.”

Lindholm sustained a lower-body injury late in the first period in the Bruins’ win over the St. Louis Blues on Nov. 12. The veteran defenseman blocked a Justin Faulk shot and crashed to the ice with 3:08 remaining in the opening frame and did not return in the contest.

Sacco provided an update on why Charlie McAvoy was placed on injured reserve as well.

“Charlie’s been dealing with a nagging injury for the last little while here,” Sacco said. “So he’s gonna be shut down for the next couple of games, and then we’ll re-evaluate him after the game in Ottawa on Saturday, and we’ll see where he is next week.”

The Bruins recalled defenseman Michael Callahan from Providence in a handful of roster moves on Tuesday.

“He’s more a of stay-at-home, defensive defenseman. He’ll be a guy that hopefully can play against some teams and give us some quality, hard minutes … make a good first pass, we’re not expecting him to create a lot of offense for us from the back end,” Sacco said. “Just be somebody that we can count on defensively to be hard to play against, protect the front of our net. Just do a good job transporting the puck up to our forwards.”

Callahan has one goal and five assists in 35 games for Providence this season. He has 33 points across 175 games over the last three seasons with the Bruins’ AHL affiliate.