Toronto Maple Leafs Roster Moves, Olympic Thoughts and Standings

The Toronto Maple Leafs are off until tomorrow’s game with Edmonton, but Monday has seen quite a bit of news so far.

The Toronto Maple Leafs game against Calgary this week has been postponed due to six players on the Flames testing positive, and the team also made some roster moves.

At this point it doesn’t seem possible that the NHL will participate in the Olympics, but nothing has yet been announced, outside of the prohibitive quarantine rules.

On the bright side, the Leafs would be sending so many players to the Olympics and with all of them risking injury for another team the cancellation might be the best thing for the team.

Toronto Maple Leafs Roster Changes

Yesterday the Toronto Maple Leafs made a couple roster moves.

I though Kristians Rubins played fine in a limited role.  It’s good to know that – at the very least – the Leafs have a competent defensive and physical presence who can fill in in a pinch, and provide solid depth insurance.

The Leafs clearly need to get Justin Holl out of their top four, and so we could be seeing a lot of Rubins in the future. In the meantime, the Leafs will test out another depth option in Carl Dahlstrom.

Dahlstrom is 26, won’t score and is physical.  Rubins didn’t have a great game on Saturday, but I would guess this has more to do with just trying out options so that they know what they have.

With Dahlstrom, Rubins and Duszak, the Leafs have more than enough depth to justify trading Holl and maybe Dermott too.  I think they’re main deadline addition will be an upgrade to the top four so they can leave the Sandin/Liljegren tandem in tact.  However, I think Liljegren could also easily play top four minutes and should already be replacing Justin Holl.

Brett Seney is a small, skilled winger who is having a great AHL season so far. He has NHL experience and is yet another player who is a perfectly adequate fourth liner.  The Leafs depth is mind-blowing if you think about it.  Joey Anderson had a hattrick this weekend, Josh Ho-Sang is tearing it up and Nick Robertson will soon be back.

The Leafs are 7-2-1 in their last ten games, and with 40 points are in a tie for first overall.  They are about to have the league’s best power-play, they’re getting some of the best goaltending, and Auston Matthews is getting hot.

The Toronto Maple Leafs play the Oilers tomorrow night.