Sam Ersson playing himself onto Four Nations radar

Sam Ersson is getting himself back on track. It’s been an up and down season for him — at times injury riddled, at others inconsistent in play — but now that’s he’s back on the ice again, he’s looking to hit the ground running.

His return to action against the Stars on Thursday was imperfect in some ways — he worked through a bit of rust, and the collective team effort never manifested enough to bring them even close to a win — but his effort was still quite solid, on the whole.

“Sam’s always been able to handle situations like this,” head coach John Tortorella said after the game, “that’s the most encouraging part for me because I thought he played really well. Hopefully he can grow off…