FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – The wait is over.
The mystery injury is no more, fingers crossed.
Black Friday marked a sunny news day in South Florida, as two-thirds of the Toronto Maple Leafs’ first line appear healthy and raring to go.
Both Auston Matthews and Matthew Knies returned to their usual positions — top line, top power-play unit — at a spirited team practice in Fort Lauderdale before catching a charter to Tampa for Saturday’s prime-time showdown against the Lightning.
“It’s not fun watching, obviously. It definitely kills me not to be out there,” said Matthews, announcing his readiness.
“It’s more so excitement just to be back. You know, I didn’t forget how to play hockey over the last three weeks, but obviously there’s gonna be a little bit of rust.”
To that end, the centreman vows to simplify his game as he slides in between Knies and William Nylander.
Yes, that means coach Craig Berube will start Matthews and the piping-hot Mitch Marner on separate lines for the first time all season.
The chemistry between Marner and John Tavares has been a major reason for the resilient Maple Leafs climb to the top of the Atlantic Division with a 7-2 run during Matthews’ 26-day absence.
Matthews’ long-awaited return makes for two legitimate scoring lines.
“We’ve missed him,” Berube said. “He’s been out a while, and it’s great to have him back. Looking forward to it. And he looks really good out there. A lot of energy, skating well, moving well.”
Adds Nylander: “We have unbelievable chemistry when we play together. I mean, the way we find each other. And obviously he’s the best goal scorer in the league, so it’s fun to play with him.”
The timing is critical with another key forward on the shelf.
Bobby McMann (day-to-day) suffered a lower-body injury in Wednesday’s loss to Florida that will likely sideline him for at least a couple games. McMann did not skate Friday but is still travelling with the team.
Matthews’ undisclosed injury has been a hot source of speculation, and a stir was caused when it was revealed the superstar flew to Munich to have his ailment attended to by Dr. Hans-Wilhelm Muller-Wohlfahrt — the celebrated physician who has treated Usain Bolt, Bono, Luciani Pavarotti and Christian McCaffery.
“I don’t think there’s really any secrecy. Like, I don’t think we did anything outside of the rules of providing information to you guys and the NHL. So I think it just gets a little bit blown out of proportion with the marketplace and you guys being a little bit nosy,” Matthews said.
“I think it’s my choice whether or not I want to share the extent of injury. And I mean, you look around the league, (it’s) ‘lower-body injury,’ ‘upper-body injury’ on every single team. So I think it’s just been made out to be a bigger deal than it is. And, I mean, I don’t really care. It’s up for you guys to talk about it and do your thing. But in the end, I’m just going to focus on myself and focus on the team and being the best that I can.”
The whole point of Matthews’ stepping out of the lineup for nearly four weeks was to put this injury behind him for good.
As long as it’s taken care of, Leafs Nation won’t be overly concerned about what methods or how long it took to fix their captain.
Knies turns the other cheek
While a vocal portion of Leafland was up in arms that Zach Whitecloud was neither penalized nor suspended for the hard body check that took Knies out for two games, the injured player owned his role in the collision.
“I put myself in a tough scenario. I was just trying to get the puck in, and you gotta keep your head up,” Knies said. “I am kind of upset that led me to getting hurt and missing a few games.”
Knies said Whitecloud apologized to him after the game and didn’t express any frustration that the Vegas defenceman dodged suspension after watching the replay a few times.
“I got to trust the league in the sense that they got the play right, and I’m happy that we’re healthy and we can just kind of move on from there,” Knies said.
Asked if he had suffered a concussion, Knies said he’d rather keep the nature of his upper-body injury to himself.
Five-forward power play is back, too
Searching for an offensive boost, Toronto ran up-tempo five-forward power-play drills Friday, with Marner replacing defenceman Morgan Rielly on the point.
“It looked really good, just the puck movement and quickness of it all,” Berube enthused. “I really like Knies at the net, and I really like J.T. in the in the bumper.”
Power-play coach Marc Savard got off to a rocky start in Toronto, as the Leafs’ 5-on-4 unit dipped to last place, but he has since seen them climb to 16th in the category (20.3 per cent).
“He’s not too far removed from playing, and I think he’s a great communicator and open to ideas,” Matthews said. “He’s a smart hockey mind as well. So, it’s easy to bounce things off of each other here and there. I think he’s been a really good addition to the team.”
One-Timers: Alex Nylander appears to be the odd man out and projects to be a healthy scratch. William’s younger brother was given a prime look on the top power-play unit Wednesday but had that opportunity taken away as the game went on… After Conor Timmins took a couple bad penalties against the Panthers, we wondered if Jani Hakanpää might get into the lineup. That isn’t the case. Hakanpää will need to be patient… Toronto will catch the Lightning tired off a back-to-back. The Bolts won a close one in Nashville, 3-2 in overtime, Friday while the Leafs were in their city waiting.
Maple Leafs projected lineup Saturday in Tampa Bay:
Knies – Matthews – Nylander
Holmberg – Tavares – Marner
Roberson – Minten – Lorentz
Steeves – Dewar – Grebenkin
Rielly – Ekman-Larsson
