Toronto came away with a 7-2 win.<\/a><\/p>\nIt wasn’t all great though, as Toronto did lose defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson with less than ten minutes to go in the third period with what the team has described as an upper-body injury.<\/p>\n
It didn’t stop Toronto on Saturday but it would be a huge blow to the offense as Ekman-Larsson has been as reliable and steady as can be so far this year with 20 points through 25 games.<\/p>\n
What Craig Berube actually said about Oliver Ekman-Larsson’s status<\/p>\n
It doesn’t seem too serious at first glance, and head coach Craig Berube is optimistic that it was just a little discomfort that held him out.<\/p>\n
After Saturday’s win against Pittsburgh, Berube spoke to reporters about Ekman-Larsson’s status but sounded way more optimistic than he has been, though stopped short of saying OEL was going to be alright.<\/p>\n
I’m hoping he’s fine. I don’t know yet, but we’ll evaluate him tomorrow. I think he’ll be okay, but we’ll see.<\/p>\n
There’s always a bit of extra work involved when it comes to making sure a player is fully healthy, and with their next game on Tuesday, it gives Ekman-Larsson a couple of days to heal up whatever is bothering him.<\/p>\n
Why Nylander’s reaction will calm Leafs fans more than the official update<\/p>\n
Though, there may be room for more optimism as Leafs forward William Nylander told reporters after the game that Ekman-Larsson assured him that it wasn’t serious.<\/p>\n
Nylander was short and sweet with his post-game comments:<\/p>\n
Nylander relaying that Ekman-Larsson told him he was fine will reassure some fans, even if it’s just a quick post-game comment rather than an official medical update.<\/p>\n
While it’s still not officially known what happened to Ekman-Larsson, and the team has yet to provide a detailed update, Nylander’s comment suggests that, inside the room, there isn’t major concern right now regarding a serious injury.<\/p>\n
OEL has been remarkably durable over the past three seasons, only missing seven games the past two seasons, and hadn’t missed a game yet this year.<\/p>\n
He’s also been one of Toronto’s best players overall and arguably their top defenseman over the past few weeks. He has a nine-game point streak and will tie Tom Kurvers’ franchise record with another point in his next game.<\/p>\n
Until the Leafs issue a formal update, Nylander’s quote is simply another encouraging sign rather than a guarantee about Ekman-Larsson’s health.<\/p>\n
Toronto can’t afford to have it go any other way right now, especially when they just put in their best effort of the entire season.<\/p>\n
Previously on Hockey Patrol<\/p>\n
POLL<\/p>\n
16 HOURS AGO\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0|\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0491 ANSWERS<\/p>\n
Craig Berube and William Nylander sounded very different after Oliver Ekman-Larsson left the game<\/p>\n
Do you think Oliver Ekman-Larsson’s injury is serious?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo credit: Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images Craig Berube and William Nylander gave differing opinions on the status of Oliver…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":331987,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5106],"tags":[44111,5,20,7879,5172,4,18071,782,66,31,5171,1114],"class_list":{"0":"post-331986","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-maple-leafs","8":"tag-craig-berube-post-game","9":"tag-hockey","10":"tag-maple-leafs","11":"tag-maple-leafs-news","12":"tag-mapleleafs","13":"tag-nhl","14":"tag-nhl-news-and-rumors","15":"tag-oliver-ekman-larsson","16":"tag-toronto","17":"tag-toronto-maple-leafs","18":"tag-torontomapleleafs","19":"tag-william-nylander"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115643264762025093","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/331987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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