Maple Leafs’ Auston Matthews gives ‘100%’ take after season-long injury

The Toronto Maple Leafs lost to the Florida Panthers in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. After another unfathomable Game 7 loss, Leafs players and coaches have been speaking to the media. It’s an NHL tradition of sorts to unveil a scroll of injuries players were dealing with after elimination. Auston Matthews missed time during the season with an injury and said it impacted him through the Maple Leafs’ playoff run. What did he say about the injury and the upcoming season?

“I got injured in training camp,” Matthews to the media, per The Athletic’s James Mirtle. “[It] impacted a lot of different things” throughout the year. Obviously, I wasn’t feeling great throughout the first month or so of the season, took some time off, went to Germany, did all these things to try to feel better. Then kind of got to a place where I felt like I could manage it.”

“Definitely a tough year physically, but with some time off and just going through my own process and treatment and everything, I’m really confident I’ll be back 100 percent come next season. And there’s nothing to worry about,” Matthews said.

Matthews traveled to Germany to try and seek help for the injury. San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey did the same when he got hurt last year. And Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reported that he believes Matthew Tkachuk did the same for his injury. Matthews missed 15 regular-season games with the undisclosed injury.

“Matthews also explained that he didn’t want to state the exact nature of the injury because he believed opponents could target that area in the future. ‘It’s my right to (keep it private), I believe,’ he said,” Mirtle wrote.

Matthews said that the injury did not impact him in every game, but lingered throughout the year. His goal-scoring numbers were drastically down, with 33 goals in 67 games. That is his lowest goals-per-game rate since his rookie year, when he scored 40 in a full 82-game slate.