Two important players for the Toronto Maple Leafs were unable to finish Thursday’s pre-season game against the Montreal Canadiens. But both injuries don’t appear to be major issues.
Forward William Nylander exited the game in the first period after suffering an apparent upper-body injury. John Tavares was also banged up on a hit in the first period and saw limited ice time the rest of the way.
“He’ll be ok, he’s fine,” head coach Craig Berube said of Nylander. “Nothing to worry about.”
On Tavares, Berube said “The leg was stiffing up” and that the lack of ice time was because “I didn’t want to take a chance.”
Nylander’s injury came as the Leafs were chasing down the Canadiens in transition. Teammate Nick Robertson pushed Nylander with the end of his stick, knocking him onto the ice and into the leg of Montreal’s Christian Dvorak.
Nylander stayed down on the ice and grabbed at his head after the play. He immediately went to the team’s locker room and was later ruled out for “precautionary reasons.”
“Obviously, elephant in the room, with the Willy situation. It’s unfortunate, I was trying to give him a bit of a boost there,” explained Robertson post-game. “It is what it is… He’s doing good and we’ll see how he is in the next few days.”
Tavares was hurt when he was hit while breaking the puck out of the defensive zone by Canadiens winger Michael Pezzetta. The veteran centre slowly made his way to the bench in visible discomfort but returned to the game shortly after and scored a goal. He finished the game with just 12:35 of ice time, fewer than every forward except Nylander.