When the Leafs' #1 goaltender, Joseph Woll, suffered a high-ankle sprain back in early December, the loss had some potentially disastrous consequences for the Leafs, who had Ilya Samsonov playing well below the team's level of expectation and, of course, the jury was still out on 3rd stringer Martin Jones at the time.
Of course, we now know about Jones' beautiful run of games during December and January that propped the Leafs up until Ilya Samsonov found his game again in January, and the team has performed much better than expected in Woll's absence, all things considered.
The Leafs have had Woll back and practicing with the team for some time now, but have told the media that it's more about when Woll feels ready to return now than it is about the team's concerns about whether or not he's ready. They believed he was ready this week, which is why he was sent to the American Hockey League on a conditioning loan. Woll played for the Marlies against the Laval Rocket on Friday, skating away with a 4-1 win, stopping 36 of 37 shots in the contest. So yeah, he looks ready.
During the Saturday Headlines segment on Hockey Night in Canada last night, Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman revealed that Woll is indeed very close to returning for the Leafs, finally. Friedman revealed that the Leafs will take the next day or two to determine what the plan is moving forward, whether that be to retain 3 goaltenders and work with a 3-goalie rotation for the next month and a half of if they'll simply waive a goaltender to make way for Woll's return.
Obviously, with how well Jones and Samsonov have played at points this season, neither one is clearing waivers at this point, so it's more likely than not that the Leafs carry 3 goalies unless they happen to include one in a trade to avoid losing him for nothing. These next 48 hours should be interesting.
