The Toronto Maple Leafs are gaining two key forwards back as it appears that both John Tavares and Calle Jarnkrok will return to the ice on Wednesday.
It's been a scary few days for the Maple Leafs, as numerous injuries to stars Auston Matthews, William Nylander, John Tavares and more have brought about a lot of questions regarding how the Maple Leafs will look come opening night. Nylander appears to be back in the mix, returning to practice Monday and it was noted that Auston Matthews was also practicing with the club.
But what about Tavares and Jarnkrok? Well, according to David Alter of The Hockey News: it won't be long until we see them back on the ice.
This was echoed by Toronto Maple Leafs' analyst for the NHL, Dave McCarthy on X:
Tavares ended up getting injured after being hit with a cheap shot from the Montreal Canadiens' Michael Pezzetta but returned to the game and ended up opening the scoring. However, he would not participate in practice afterwards and wasn't available in the Leafs preseason game against Montreal on Saturday. Jarnkrok, who was injured shortly after Toronto's preseason game against Ottawa was looking to solidify himself on the bottom-six and perhaps find himself with a bigger role if Toronto decides to trade some pieces although the Maple Leafs could end up trading Jarnkrok himself to save cap space.
It's assumed that once Tavares and Jarnkrok return the lineup, they will return to their respective spots; Tavares in the middle between Nick Robertson and Max Pacioretty and Jarnkrok on the wing or in the middle anchoring the fourth line with either Steven Lorentz, David Kampf, Ryan Reaves or Pontus Holmberg, as the Maple Leafs now have a ton of options to work with.
It's a massive boost to the Maple Leafs to have their best potential lineup actually coming back to form, and with some other pieces coming back from injury at some point in the year, head coach Craig Berube has a lot of tools he can work with in order to build a winning lineup and that should excite Maple Leaf fans for the 2024-2025 season.
