Toronto Maple Leafs head coach Craig Berube has not decided if he will use a forward on defense as the club dresses an undermanned lineup against the Montreal Canadiens and Scotiabank Arena on Saturday. However, he did say it was a possibility.
“I don’t have a lot of guys with experience that have played back there other than Mitch (Marner),” Berube said following the club’s optional morning skate.
The Maple Leafs will be forced to dress only five defensemen due to a combination of injuries and a lack of salary cap space. With a long-term injured reserve exception not possible due to how late injuries to Jake McCabe and Oliver Ekman-Larsson occurred and with no salary cap space, Toronto has to play one game short before they are allowed a call-up exception under article 50.10 of the NHL’s collective bargaining agreement.
Why The Maple Leafs Will Dress 5 Defensemen Against The Canadiens On SaturdayThe Toronto Maple Leafs will likely dress one player short when they host the Montreal Canadiens at Scotiabank Arena on Saturday.
Marner is the obviously choice to play some minutes on defense given, that the player occupies the role on the club’s top power-play unit.
“I heard he’s played it a couple of times throughout and looked pretty good. So, yeah, I think he would be the pick,” Maple Leafs forward Scott Laughton said.
During the club’s pre-game meeting there appears to be no shortage of volunteers that would move up to play on the back end.
“It seems like they want to play D,” Steven Lorentz revealed. ” I’ve played some D in my career too over the years, just trying to, again, fill in at times. And I think I’ve been exposed a few times, so hopefully I’m not back there for too long. But, no, if that were to come up, then I’d feel comfortable doing that. But there are a few guys that are more incapable of filling in for a few shifts, I think.”
Marner is the only player who played in NHL games on defense via a true experiment.
Following the training camp discussions ahead of the 2022-23 NHL season, then-head coach Sheldon Keefe he had indeed used Marner on defense late in games when the team was chasing a lead.
While Marner did help on the offensive end of things, there was one instance when Marner lost a one-on-one battle with New Jersey Devils forward Nico Hischier, resulting in a quality scoring chance against.
He stated that Marner “delivered as good of a scoring chance and puck delivery to the net as we had all period” and that his puck touches were crucial in breaking out of the defensive zone. Keefe explicitly noted, “He’s not out there to defend; he’s out there to spark our offense”. While acknowledging a defensive breakdown occurred on Marner’s shift (a one-on-one against Nico Hischier). Keefe attributed it mistake more to a lack of backchecking support from the other forwards rather than Marner’s individual defending.
On Feb. 29, 2024, veteran defenseman Mark Giordano suffered an injury, leaving the Maple Leafs with only five defensemen. To manage the workload, Marner was called upon to take shifts on the blueline. Keefe revealed post-game that the possibility of using Marner on defense had been discussed before Giordano’s injury. The Leafs had dressed a lineup with six left-shot defensemen due to Timothy Liljegren being out, creating an imbalance. The pre-game consideration involved using Marner, a right shot, to provide a different look on the back end even before the injury forced their hand.
The Leafs quickly rectified this by acquiring right-handed defenseman Ilya Lyubushkin ahead of the trade deadline.
Report: Maple Leafs to Re-Acquire Defenseman Ilya Lyubushkin From Ducks For Draft PicksAccording to Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman, the Leafs are acquiring the Russian defenseman with 75 percent of his salary cap hit retained in exchange for third and sixth-round draft picks.
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