Toronto Maple Leafs superstar center Auston Matthews took the ice for the club's optional morning skate on Saturday. But when will he return to game action? Auston Matthews will reportedly not be in the lineup when the Toronto Maple Leafs take on the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday. According to TSN's Darren Dreger, the 27-year-old forward, who's been out with an upper-body injury since Nov. 3. Matthews was placed on Toronto's injured reserve on Nov. 8, retroactive to the day the team lost 2-1 to the Minnesota Wild. The Maple Leafs announced on the morning of Nov. 5 that he was day-to-day with an upper-body injury and wouldn't play against the Boston Bruins that night. Matthews wasn't on the ice for practice again on Friday and didn't skate on Thursday either, Maple Leafs head coach Craig Berube said. "No setbacks," Berube added. "We got two games in a long stretch here of time, so we're just letting him recover." Toronto has won four of their five games without the forward in the lineup. Their power play, which operated below average before Matthews went down, has scored 42.1 percent of the time since Nov. 4. "I've talked before we want to get him 100 percent [healthy]. We want to get it behind us, so he can move forward and we can forward here. But [the schedule] does help," Berube said on Friday. "Would I like him back? Yeah, for sure. But it is what it is. We just gotta keep moving on without him right now." The Maple Leafs captain had an upper-body injury during training camp, and head coach Craig Berube confirmed that it was the same upper-body issue that had caused Matthews to leave practice. When asked if Matthews experienced a setback in his recovery earlier in the week, Berube dismissed the notion. Matthews has five goals and six assists for 11 points in 13 games this season. Berube confirmed that Matthews did not skate on Wednesday while the team was in Washington to face the Capitals and hadn’t taken the ice in recent days. The Leafs will host Connor McDavid and the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday, then won’t play again until Wednesday when they host the Vegas Golden Knights. Their next game after that is four days later — a week from Sunday — when they host the Utah Hockey Club.
