Toronto Maple Leafs’ defenseman Victor Mete skates after being out nearly two months with a lower-body injury. Auston Matthews suffered a knee sprain during his team’s 3-2 overtime win against the New York Rangers on Wednesday. The Toronto Maple Leafs star forward will be out for a minimum of three weeks, the club announced on Friday. Maple Leafs head coach Sheldon Keefe said he didn't know specifically when Matthews got hurt in the game against the Rangers but did notice that the forward was sore a couple of times on the bench. When Matthews woke up the next morning, he was still sore and so he came in for an MRI and that's when the details of his injury emerged. The Maple Leafs moved Pontus Holmberg up into the top six ahead of their game against the Ottawa Senators. "It's a big opportunity for me," Holmberg said. "I thank them for that." Holmberg's one of the few Swedes who enter the NHL without a solid grasp of the English language given that he's from the northern part of the country. But he has quickly won the favor of both his coach and teammates for how seamless his transition has been at the NHL level. Matthews missed two games with an undisclosed injury earlier this month, when that occurred, the Maple Leafs tried William Nylander and Alex Kerfoot as second-line center options. [https://www.si.com/nhl/maple-leafs/news/maple-leafs-line-tracker-2022-23-season] But with Matthews out for a longer term, Keefe wants to see what Holmberg is all about. "I think it's a good opportunity for him to jump in there and see what he can do," Keefe said of Holmberg. The 23-year-old rookie has five goals and seven assists in 30 games with the Maple Leafs this season. With Matthews out of the lineup, John Tavares moves up to become the team's No. 1 center. He skated on a line with Michael Bunting and Mitch Marner. Tavares should fit in well as he's coming off a game where he had eight shots on goal. The Maple Leafs captain has 21 goals and 27 assists in 49 games this season and is coming off back-to-back performances in which he registered eight shots on goal, matching his season high set earlier in the season. "I'm just trying to play my game and make an impact in a way that I know that I can," Tavares said. Bunting will replace Matthews on Toronto's top power-play unit. While the pesky forward's experience as part of the previous five-forward PP experiment should serve him well, it'll be a bit different without a shooter like Matthews' at Toronto's disposal. "It's different because he (Matthews) could score, but also just the amount of attention he generates," Tavares said of Matthews. "It changes the pressure that we get and the looks from different teams and whatnot." What should serve the Maple Leafs well is how the team has managed to overcome Matthews' absence in the past. They are 31-16-2 all-time with No. 34 in the lineup "I think that if there's anything that we've learned about our team this season that is that we've been resilient no matter who's been in or out of the lineup," Keefe said. "I'm not sure where we are in the league in man-games lost but it's got to be significant." The Maple Leafs have seen their defense depth get tested throughout the season with injuries to key players like Morgan Rielly, who missed time with a knee injury. Jake Muzzin is still out indefinitely with a cervical spine issue and will be re-evaluated in late February. TJ Brodie remains out with a rib injury (his second injury stint this season). But without Matthews, the Leafs have their real first test of how injuries up front will affect the team.
