Wednesday's leading scorer limped off against Doncaster last month with a broken bone in his right foot and was ruled out for the season.
There was the hope that the former Rangers star would be back for the end-of-season play-offs, should Wednesday get there although that possibility is touch and go.
On a storybook return, he told Footymad: "There’s a small bit of hope that I can return before the end of the season for at least the play-offs – anything else is a bonus really.
"When I return, I hopefully carry on playing the way which I was but you never know how these things will work out, fingers crossed that I come back and everything’s ok but like I said, you never know.
"Hopefully it’s getting better. I am having a scan next week and we can tell the damage from that and then we can move on. I have a stress fracture in my foot and sometimes these things take time to heel properly.
"It’s a bit gut-wrenching to be ruled out when I am playing well but these things happen in football and you have to come back from things stronger but hopefully I can get my head down, get fit and get back in the team."
Wednesday have missed not only MacLean's prowess in front of goal but his link up play as well, but the Scotsman knows that a few good performances will give The Owls the extra two or hopefully three games the fans are crying out for.
He added: "We are going through a bad patch at the moment and hopefully we can come through it but if we get a result on Saturday that will push us in the right direction towards the play-offs."