The Toronto Maple Leafs are enjoying a very positive game against the Columbus Blue Jackets. As Kirill Marchenko returned back to the place where he wanted to escape from and ended up opening the scoring, and all the other Leafs stars got on the board to put up several goals in a big-time win, the Leafs also suffered a little bit of a loss.
In the second half of the first period, defenseman Jake McCabe was going in for a check against Blue Jackets winger Kent Johnson near the boards and due to some freak accident, he got a stick in the face that caused him to leave the game.
McCabe was not seen on the bench to start the second period, and then the Leafs confirmed that he was not going to return to the game.
Jake McCabe is not on the Leafs bench to begin the second period after exiting the game following this scary stick to the face#leafs pic.twitter.com/HqSBw0oMJ5
— Leafslatest (@Leafslatest) October 21, 2026
It's an accident that is extremely unfortunate. Johnson is skating with his stick off the ice and out in front of him and as he is trying to avoid the hit from McCabe, he lifts his stick and it jabs the Leafs defenseman in the face.
It was not clear if it caught McCabe in the eye or broke his nose or even just caused a big gash in his forehead, but he had to leave the game and not return.
Head coach Jim Hiller will most likely have an update on McCabe's status, and maybe even tell us what happened, after the game. And maybe will reveal that since the Leafs ended up having a multi-goal lead at that point, they would have rather had McCabe stay out for precautionary reasons more than he actually couldn't play.
Losing McCabe would be disastrous for the Maple Leafs
If McCabe is out for any significant amount of time it would no doubt be a disaster. The Leafs are already missing the steady veteran presence of Chris Tanev, and their defense looks terrible because of it. To then lose the only other stable defensive force that the Leafs have, would be a potential season-ending sort of absence.
While Darren Raddysh has looked good, the rest of the Leafs' blue line in Morgan Rielly, Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Troy Stecher, Nick Blankenburg, and whatever recent Marlies call-up they have on the roster, is simply not good enough to even be a competitive hockey team. The Leafs are lacking true defenders and stoppers when everyone is healthy, and now they might have lost their two best defensemen to injury.
Let's just hope that they can avoid that nightmare and McCabe just needs a couple stitches, or something.
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