Leafs Make Unfortunate Announcement Regarding Auston Matthews
The Toronto Maple Leafs take on the Boston Bruins Tuesday night and made a surprising announcement regarding Auston Matthews ahead of their morning skate.
Matthews has struggled under Craig Berube offensively, but has been largely very good in the defensive aspects of the game. That obviously equates to lower point totals, but those will get better with time. Matthews has just two goals in his last five games and did not score in either game over the weekend for the Leafs.
Although the Leafs' power play finally scored on Sunday against the Minnesota Wild, they will have to look to continue that momentum without Matthews Tuesday night.
Ahead of their morning skate, the Leafs announced that Matthews will not play tonight and is listed as day-to-day with an upper-body injury. It's unclear as to when or where the injury occurred, but if it has been lingering, that could also be playing into his much lower scoring pace to begin the season.
Through 13 games, the former first-overall pick has 5 goals and 11 points in the first year of his four-year extension that he signed last off-season and his first as captain.
With the Leafs playing three games in five nights this week, the two days off before Friday's game against the Detroit Red Wings may mean that it is just a one-game absence for Matthews. This will mark the fourth game in the calendar year that the Scottsdale, Arizona native has missed against the Bruins, with three of them coming during their first-round playoff series when he suffered from an illness that was never clarified.
| POLL | ||
NOVEMBRE 5 | 2186 ANSWERS Leafs Make Unfortunate Announcement Regarding Auston Matthews Will Matthews score 50 goals this season? | ||
| Yes | 939 | 43 % |
| No | 1128 | 51.6 % |
| I don't care, he's better defensively | 119 | 5.4 % |
| List of polls | ||
