Leafs pleased with response to injury issues Auston Matthews, Frederik Andersen and Zack Hyman are among the key players who have missed time this season, but team depth has helped Toronto weather the storm, Kristen Shilton writes.

Kristen Shilton TSN Toronto Maple Leafs Reporter Follow|Archive

The Maple Leafs have endured injuries to a superstar centre, one of their top-line wingers and their starting goaltender, among others this season. Still, they sit second overall in the NHL standings, far from feeling sorry for all the minor obstacles they’ve faced along the way.

“It hasn’t been too bad for us. We’ve been pretty lucky,” said defenceman Ron Hainsey after the Leafs’ optional morning skate on Monday before facing the Nashville Predators. “Obviously players are out here and there, but it’s not like we’ve dealt with a rash of injuries and we have plenty of guys who have the ability to step up. If we stick to our game plan when we’re missing a player or two, we’ll be fine.”

Including Monday, the Leafs will have lost 37 man-games to various injuries: Auston Matthews (14 games), Zach Hyman (eight), Tyler Ennis (seven), Frederik Andersen (six) and Garret Sparks (two). There were also the 28 games William Nylander missed during his contract holdout – another challenge the Leafs handled without looking much worse for wear.

Mike Babcock said on Monday he didn’t know when Andersen, Sparks or Hyman would be back, but they’re all much closer to a return than Ennis, who broke his ankle on Dec. 22. It’s been business as usual for the Leafs, regardless of who is available and who isn’t.

“Looking up and down our lineup we have so much talent,” said Matthews. “Any given night you can play with any player and you’re going to get a pretty good player on either side. So just try to develop chemistry with whoever is there, play fast and have the puck.”

“Obviously Fred being out, he’s a huge part of this team, you don’t want that. But we have good players here,” added Hainsey. “[Michael Hutchinson] came in, stepped up right away, did a great job for us. I think we’ve been pretty fortunate for the most part.”

The time away for some key pieces has forced Babcock to shuffle his lines more than in the past, jockeying wingers up and down the lineup regularly. In his eyes, that’s not necessarily a bad thing and won’t change when Toronto is at full health again.

“We’ll actually be able to change our lines quite a bit just due to matchups because we’ll have more people to do that with,” he said. “Every time we’ve lost a player, we’ve found another one, which has been real good for us because that shows we have good depth throughout the organization. Any time you get an injury, you can feel sorry for yourself; doesn’t do much good. You just want to continue to find players and improve your depth.”

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For most players, the word “slump” wouldn’t be tied to their production after going five games without a goal. But top offensive producers like Matthews don’t always escape such designations.

When the third-year centre tallied his 20th goal of the season in the third period of Saturday’s 5-0 win over Vancouver, it broke the longest goal-scoring “slump” of his campaign before it hit six games. Matthews finished Saturday with three points, bringing his total to 39 points in 27 outings this season, but he believes he’s capable of more.

“Can always be better,” Matthews said. “I think last Saturday was a good win for us and a good step for us moving forward. Another really good challenge here tonight…for us to take another step forward.”

Matthews played with fairly consistent linemates in his first two NHL seasons, including Nylander and Hyman. This year he’s had a more rotating crop of wingers, including current partners Andreas Johnsson and Nylander.

“I don’t mind; sometimes stuff isn’t clicking so you have to make a switch,” he said. “But our line right now, we can continue to work well together and hopefully find some consistency in the next couple weeks or so. But then again, I’m not making the lines so we’ll see what happens.”

Matthews is over a month removed now from the shoulder injury that held him out for four weeks and Babcock thinks he’s “in a good spot” but has to find that drive to be even better each day.

“The biggest challenge for him – just like John Tavares, just like Mitch Marner, just like Morgan Rielly, just like any of those guys who think they’re the best at their position in the game – is it’s every day. It’s every shift,” Babcock said. “You have to love it more than everybody else in the game because you have to keep getting better. You have to keep grinding to get better.”

In fact, Babcock thinks Matthews doesn’t have to look any further than his own dressing room to see what it takes to constantly be at his best.

"We have a real good example for our guys in [Patrick] Marleau and in Tavares and in the professionalism they have,” Babcock said. “God touched you with the wand and gave you the skill, but he didn’t necessarily give you the work ethic to grind every day and keep getting better. If you want to be the best of the best, it’s a long career.”

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The Leafs have beaten the Predators in four straight matchups, but past success won’t be enough to earn Toronto another victory against a perennial contender like Nashville.

“You have to bring your A-game against a team like this,” Matthews said. “They take very few nights off. It’ll be a good challenge for us. They have a very complete team, a lot of depth. They play well every night and they’re fast, they have good goaltending, their top-four D, you can put them up there with [any] top D in the league.”

Toronto’s own defence corps – headed by Rielly, Hainsey and Jake Gardiner – has taken heat for not measuring up to that of other contenders like Nashville, but Hainsey doesn’t think they’ll be at too much of a disadvantage Monday night.

“Mo [is second in the] league in scoring by defencemen (with 45 points), so I don’t think he’s doing too shabby in that department,” Hainsey noted. “But it takes all 20 guys to win; it takes the entire team. They have a great team. Obviously their D has been an exceptional top four for a number of years now and they have good forwards.”

More than anything, Babcock hopes the Leafs can build on their most recent victory, starting with how they kept scoring chances low.

“I thought last game we were dialled in,” he said. “We don’t worry about shots, we worry about scoring chances. That’s our focus here. To keep our scoring chances down, we have to spend time in the offensive zone. We have to continue to work harder in the offensive zone, create chances, because when we do that we have success.”

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When discussing Travis Dermott last week, Babcock said the Leafs see potential in him to eventually take a top-four defensive role.

In his NHL career to date, Dermott has only ever been a third-pairing blueliner, one averaging 17:40 minutes per game this season and getting increased responsibility on the penalty kill.

Dermott has also found himself with the worst plus-minus among Toronto skaters (minus-4) this year, so there’s more development needed before he’s ready to be one of the team’s top backend players.

“Dermy is a good player and has an opportunity to be a real good player,” Babcock said. “Just has to continue to learn the game and read the game and the better he does that, the more he’s going to play and the more efficient he’s going to be for us.”

No one understands that better than Dermott, and he’s hoping a top-four position is something well within reach down the road.

“It’s hockey. Nothing is promised,” he said. “Could have a bad game tonight and not be in the lineup the next night. Every day and you have a game plan in place, and it’s every player’s individual goal to move up and be playing more. Personally I’d like to move into that spot. If they have it available for me, hopefully I can step in and grab it.”

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Maple Leafs projected lines vs. Predators:

Forwards

Brown-Tavares-Marner

Johnsson-Matthews-Nylander

Marleau-Kadri-Kapanen

Lindholm-Gauthier-Moore

Defence

Rielly-Hainsey

Gardiner-Zaitsev

Dermott-Ozhiganov

Goalies

Hutchinson starts

Kaskisuo