BUFFALO (LGS) — Nathan Paetsch will make his season debut tonight for the Buffalo Sabres as Henrik Tallinder will sit out with a reported upper body injury, an injury that LGS.com has learned could possibly be a re-fractured arm. It is believed that Tallinder re-aggravated his left forearm — which he broke during last season's Conference Finals — to the extent of possibly fracturing it again.

We stress possibly because the Sabres have yet to officially confirm the extent of the injury. At mid-afternoon today, LGS.com spoke with another source close to the team who saw Tallinder at the Arena this morning. The source confirmed Henrik was definitely favoring his left arm but the defenseman merely shrugged it off as a bad bruise.

The injury occurred when Tallinder took a hard, straight-on hit from Trent Hunter with 1:58 remaining in the first period of Thursday's game against the Islanders. Tallinder was being chased behind the Buffalo net by Miroslav Satan when Hunter came in to lay a hard hit on Tallinder. The impact broke the Buffalo defenseman's stick and you could see his left forearm — which he used to brace for the hit — waving by his side seconds later. Shortly after, Tallinder was seen on the bench favoring his left arm. Remarkably, he finished the game, assisting on Maxim Afinogenov's second period goal.

Buffalo does have some good news on the injury front as Derek Roy and Jochen Hecht are both ready to go. Hecht will most likely sport a full shield tonight after taking a nasty cut under his lip that caused him to lose some flesh and teeth. Roy was suffering what appeared to be a minor groin or hip flexor injury.

Buffalo attempts to break the NHL record tonight for consecutive wins to start a season. The game will be televised on MSG locally and has also been added by HDNet.