Let the good times roll; Leafs activate three additional players from protocol

Per the team's official PR account on Twitter, forwards Jason Spezza, Alexander Kerfoot, and Wayne Simmonds have returned to practice on Monday.

With these three players, along with Tavares, having exited COVID protocol, the Leafs now have just 10 players in protocol, down from the original 14.

The news comes just a day after the league postponed some additional games, including the Leafs' December 29th meeting with the Pittsburgh Penguins at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto.

While the Leafs still have quite a ways to go before they'll reach a full compliment of healthy players, coaches and other team personnel, it's encouraging that all of the cardio testing has yielded positive results thus far.

With the NHL re-implementing taxi squads, hopefully this will be the beginning of the end of any additional delays in the 2021-22 campaign.