MONTREAL– Entering into training school, there didn’t look to be any type of lineup spots offered on the Toronto Maple Leafs blue line. However things transformed when John Klingberg left midway through a Sept. 27 preseason video game against the Buffalo Sabres with an upper-body injury.
Yet even if Klingberg’s injury is everyday and also not that serious, it highlighted one of the problems bordering the Leafs: Their deepness on the backside appeared questionable adequate to start with.
Even if Leafs GM Brad Treliving suggested ahead of training camp his team’s defence is “underrated,” Klingberg’s lack still felt like a key Jenga item being removed from an already unstable stack of wooden blocks.
Any type of injury within a presumed top 6 that’s really felt set in stone for weeks implies Conor Timmins– that played in only three games over the last 2 months of last period– taking an area.
And so with the early injury to Klingberg, train Sheldon Keefe left every other leading 4 defenceman in Toronto as well as stacked his roster for Friday’s preseason tilt against the Montreal Canadiens with every practical alternative for his 3rd set as well as, perhaps, past. The message felt clear: If there’s time in the top 4, or even a place inside the top 6, readily available, who desires it?
The Klingberg injury brought two players right into focus in Friday’s 2-1 preseason sway the Canadiens: Timothy Liljegren as well as Timmins.
Initially, Liljegren. After steadily advancing over the past two periods, the 2017 first-round pick began educating camp skating on the presumed third pair with Mark Giordano. There was essentially one inquiry Liljegren, 24, needed to answer this period: If there’s an injury in the top four, is he all set for full time minutes because function?
” I’m aiming to take an additional action,” Liljegren said surely.
In a conversation with The Athletic, Liljegren sounded less like a young player discovering his means and more like a seasoned veteran as he made use of one word repetitively: obligation. He wants more of that obligation on the charge kill, particularly.
That he was able to make a positive distinction with 3:06 of power-play time and 4:32 on the penalty kill versus the Canadiens indicates he can entering both in the normal season when it matters. The boosted task he’s yearning might have lastly arrived.
” I had some excellent stretches in 2014 when I was in the top 4, yet then games when you shed your touch a little bit and also get bumped down,” Liljegren said of staying in the top 4 this season must a work appeared. “So I need to deal with my uniformity and raise my flooring so my poor play is still constantly good, if that makes good sense.”
It does.
Keefe informed Liljegren he desires him to join the thrill a lot more. And versus the Canadiens, Liljegren looked positive in doing so repetitively.
” Simply maintain doing what he’s doing,” Keefe said when asked what Liljegren needs to do to grab a leading four area completely. “I think he’s been excellent.”
In a team-leading 24:16 TOI against the Canadiens, Liljegren was the most energetic and also dominant Leafs defenceman in all three zones, making wise electrical outlet passes at one end as well as innovative dip into the other. His puck over glass charge with less than 2 minutes remaining is the kind of mistake he’s attempting to eradicate from his video game, but those kinds of errors have ended up being less and also further between.
Liljegren seems like an all-natural replacement for Klingberg in the group’s leading two sets must injury strike the professional defenceman again. Keefe singled out the likes of Morgan Rielly, Klingberg and Liljegren as energetic, offensively-inclined blueliners he wants spread out among his top 6. Video game by game, the big-picture problems about Liljegren are dissipating.
“( Liljegren) is going to play a lot for us regardless of exactly how he slots in. We’re not also concentrated on putting a label on it,” Keefe said.
Then there’s Timmins, 25, who was right on Liljegren’s heels with 23:59 TOI versus the Canadiens.
When the Leafs traded for Timmins early last period, the 2017 second-round choice as well as offence-first blueliner was seen as an interesting long-term play with lots of hrs with the Leafs advancement staff ahead of him.
” I recognized they loved me as a player as well as the reality that they were investing in me implied a great deal to me as well as permitted me to actually give back in terms of my job ethic,” Timmins stated.
Timmins made use of the short distance in between Toronto as well as his offseason house outside of St. Catherines, Ontario, to log hefty hours at the Leafs technique center. Timmins wanted to include toughness and his focus with Leafs skating advancement specialist Paul Matheson was his volatility.
If we’re taking place ball game sheet alone, those hrs are beginning to pay off. Smooth puck moving has never been in short supply in Timmins’ video game, yet he’s turned heads by logging six points with 4 games, still tops amongst Leafs via the preseason.
There stays the opportunity, one which increases as well as decreases every day in the preseason, that Timmins won’t make the Leafs as well as will certainly have to be waived. There’s still time for Treliving as well as the Leafs monitoring to figure out the Leafs’ salary-cap photo. As well as with his preseason play, Timmins is ending up being a significantly indispensable part of those conversations. Exists a way Treliving can jam his $1.1 million AAV onto the roster? If not, Timmins, signed right into 2025, could be asserted by an additional group or might clear with waivers as well as be sent out to the Marlies for even more development.
” I don’t focus on those points,” he said resolutely Friday.
If Timmins can balance his production with even more constant defensive work, he might not have to.
Because for as lots of heads-up plays in the offensive area as Timmins made versus the Canadiens, there were a few unstable minutes in his own zone. And those will be the kinds of concerns Timmins will need to address throughout the rest of training school as well as potentially right into the regular season: While the offense exists, could he be completely trusted defensively later in the season should a spot in the leading 6 open?
After reviewing his games from last period, Timmins went into this summer focused on improving just how promptly he can close opposition plays.
” That enables me to actually transition the puck faster, catch forwards on the other group unsuspecting and raise in the thrill,” Timmins stated. “So I believe because regard, support can result in offence a lot of times and it’ll aid my video game both ways.”
Those improvements indicate Keefe is obtaining some responses as well as finding out more about just when as well as just how Timmins can be made use of defensively. Timmins will not be anticipated to log near the 4:20 of charge consume time he had against the Canadiens throughout the season, certain. But that he excited enough in a new circumstance recommends Keefe’s trust in Timmins may have grown from last period.
” He battled truly difficult tonight,” Keefe said of Timmins. “He handled some huge minutes. He had to play a number, undoubtedly in some difficult places as well as some areas that we have not used him in as much. And that’s what this time of the year is for. I assumed he was truly great tonight.”
Eventually, seeing both Liljegren and also Timmins take steps in their video game via preseason is an excellent issue for Keefe to have. Yet it won’t make his decision on which blueliners will slot in where as the normal period comes close to any type of less complicated.