With Pronger back, the Flyers are elite in the east.


Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren released an injury update for defenseman Chris Pronger, who has been out of action since mid-December with a broken first metatarsal bone in his right foot.

Pronger underwent a CAT scan on Tuesday by Dr. Steve Raikin, and the results came back positive for the Flyers.

Holmgren said that the 36-year-old has been cleared for light skating tomorrow, and will be re-evaluated on Jan. 12th.

It has been three weeks since Pronger had surgery to repair the bone. He was scheduled to miss four-to-six weeks. The likelihood that he returns to game action next week is highly unlikely.

The Flyers could be aiming for mid-to-late January.

Pronger has 15 points in 31 games in his second year with Philadelphia. He’s a plus-six, and has 24 penalty minutes. He is third among Flyers defenseman in points behind his partner in crime Matty Carle (18) and Kimmo Timonen (16).

The Flyers have been using 23-year-old Oskars Bartulis, who is a minus-three in nine games.

For the most part, the Flyers have managed without their anchor on the blue line, but that’s because of the play of Andrej Meszaros. In the six games without Pronger, Meszaros has two points, a plus-six rating and is averaging 21:21 minutes of ice time.

On the season, Meszaros has 14 points in 38 games and leads the NHL in plus/minus with a +25 rating.

Without Pronger so far this season, the Flyers are 4-3-1.