2 x Toronto Maple Leafs Prospects In Gold Medal Game

The Toronto Maple Leafs had three prospects at this summer’s World Junior Tournament and two of them will play in today’s Gold Medal Game.

Tonight at 8PM, two Toronto Maple Leafs prospects will suit up for Team Finland and take on Team Canada for the Gold.

Now, like me, you were probably surprised to find that the World Juniors were happening in the summer.   They attempted to play last Christmas at their normal time, but they had to cancel because of Covid.

The games that were already played were annulled and the tournament was rescheduled for this summer.

Two Toronto Maple Leafs Prospects in Gold Medal Game

The Toronto Maple Leafs will have two players in the final game of the World Juniors.

Matthews Knies, the third Leafs player involved, was on Team USA and has been eliminated.

Roni Hirvonen, whom the Leafs picked in the second round of the 2020 draft (59th overall) is having a great tournament with three goals and four assists in six games.

Hirvonen is a player everyone has been talking about all tournament long, and he is Finland’s captain.  Already one of the Leafs best prospects, his performance this summer has got to make people excited.

So far he hasn’t come to North America, but this year should see him suit up for the Marlies and possibly even make his NHL debut at some point.

Topi Niemela, who was  named this tournament’s best defenseman the last time it was held, has already been hyped up a lot by Leafs fans, and is arguably their best prospect right now. He leads Finland in ice-time so far this year.

Both Niemela and Hirvonen are members of a very exciting group of Leafs prospects that are just starting to transition to the NHL.

Rasmus Sandin and Timothy Liljegren will both likely be integral top-four defenseman by the end of this season, while Nick Robertson, Nick Abruzzese, Mikhail Abramov, Matthew Knies and Alex Steeves are all also on the verge of making the NHL.

This wave of NHL quality prospects is going to give the Leafs a ton of roster flexibility and trade capital moving forward.  The fact that the Salary Cap was flat during a time when the Leafs 2015-2018 drafts failed to land them any players outside the first round, and the Leafs were still able to contend is very impressive.

Moving forward, if they can be as savvy as they have been while getting an influx of players on their entry-level deals in conjunction with a rising salary cap, then they are going to be a very good team for a very long time.