Maple Leafs Recall Joseph Woll From Conditioning Loan
Feb. 26: The Maple Leafs recalled Woll from his conditioning loan on Monday, per a team announcement. He has not yet been activated from LTIR, although they won’t need to make a corresponding transaction to do so (yet) with two open roster spots. Woll stopped 36 of 37 shots in his lone AHL outing against the Laval Rocket on Friday, recording a .973 SV% in a 4-1 win for the Marlies.
Feb. 21: The Maple Leafs are assigning goaltender Joseph Woll to the AHL’s Toronto Marlies on a conditioning loan, a team release states Wednesday.
The 25-year-old Missourian has been listed as week-to-week with a high ankle sprain after sustaining the injury on a non-contact play against the Senators on Dec. 7. He’s now missed 29 games with the sprain over two and a half months, but a return is now officially on the horizon.
Head coach Sheldon Keefe said earlier this month that Woll was cleared to ramp up his workload in practice and, as such, the team was expecting his return in the middle of February. He’ll miss that benchmark by a bit, but he should be back between the pipes for Toronto by the trade deadline.
The 2016 third-round pick has been solid in his first full NHL season, posting an 8-5-1 record and a .916 SV% in 13 starts and two relief appearances. He had taken the starting role from Ilya Samsonov by the time of his injury, although a recent stretch of above-average play from the Russian makes it more of a battle for Woll to regain starts upon his return.
34-year-old Martin Jones has provided value to Toronto in a third-string role, posting a .908 SV% and 2.69 GAA in 19 games while Woll was out and Samsonov was going through the worst stretch of his career. He’s come back down to Earth after posting a SV% above .920 in five straight games at the beginning of 2024, but Woll’s impeding return and Samsonov’s improvement balances things out in the Toronto crease.
Woll has saved 7.0 goals above expected this year, per MoneyPuck, just shy of Jones’ 7.8 in four more appearances. If he maintains that pace upon this return, he should be on track to be Toronto’s playoff starter.
Woll and his $766.7K cap hit are on long-term injured reserve, so this loan follows the limitations of an LTI-specific conditioning stint. He will remain on LTIR while suiting up for the Marlies and can stay in the AHL for up to six days or three games with a possible two-game extension. If the Maple Leafs deem Woll is ready to return at the end of his loan, they must activate him off LTIR; if not, he’ll remain there until his recovery is complete.
Maple Leafs Assign Maxime Lajoie To AHL
- Maple Leafs defenseman Maxime Lajoie is no longer listed on the NHL roster on the league’s media site, indicating he’s been returned to the AHL’s Toronto Marlies, Jonas Siegel of The Athletic relays Sunday. Toronto has ferried Lajoie, 26, in between leagues multiple times over the past few weeks, although this move will likely be longer-lasting. Lajoie last played in Wednesday’s win over the Coyotes, and the Maple Leafs need roster space to reinstate Joseph Woll from LTIR and defenseman Mark Giordano from the non-roster list, both of which should occur over the next week. He’s been a decent reserve option when called upon, recording one assist and a +1 rating in seven games while averaging 12:43.
Maple Leafs Assign Marshall Rifai To AHL
After making his NHL debut earlier this week with a pair of appearances, the Maple Leafs announced (Twitter link) that they have re-assigned defenseman Marshall Rifai to AHL Toronto.
The 25-year-old was brought up earlier in the week to give the Maple Leafs a bit of extra depth on the back end and suited up twice where he had four hits and averaged a little under 12 minutes per contest. Rifai, who is on his first NHL contract after playing on an AHL deal last year, has spent most of the season with the Marlies where he has 11 points and 38 penalty minutes in 34 games.
William Lagesson (injury) and Morgan Rielly (suspension) both returned to Toronto’s lineup on Thursday which pushed Rifai back to the press box. Mark Giordano has also been away from the team for a little more than a week following the death of his father; the timing of this assignment suggests he might be ready to return.
Toronto now has an open roster spot which is notable with Joseph Woll’s LTI conditioning loan set to expire in a few days. With Rifai’s demotion, they could elect to carry three goalies upon Woll’s recall and activation to avoid the risk of having to place Martin Jones on waivers who might be more likely to be claimed this time around.
Maple Leafs Believed To Have Interest In Mario Ferraro And Luke Kunin
The Maple Leafs have shown interest in Sharks defenseman Mario Ferraro and forward Luke Kunin, reports The Fourth Period’s David Pagnotta. It’s believed that Toronto doesn’t want to part with a first-round pick for a rental but Ferraro has two years left on his contract at a $3.25MM cap charge while Kunin is controllable for one more year if he’s tendered a $3MM qualifying offer. Ferraro is logging nearly 23 minutes a night on San Jose’s back end and would certainly give Toronto a boost in their top four while Kunin has struggled offensively, scoring just eight times in 50 games so far. With Toronto’s interest, it’s worth noting that cap space is quite tight at the moment and as things stand, they can’t afford the full contract of one of those players let alone both.
Morgan Rielly’s Suspension Affirmed By NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman
With the fifth and final game of Morgan Rielly’s suspension being set to be served on Wednesday, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman was going to need to get his ruling on Rielly’s appeal made quickly. That decision has now been made with the league announcing that Bettman has affirmed the five-game ban and that no change will be coming.
The NHLPA filed the appeal last week on Rielly’s behalf. According to the notes in Bettman’s ruling, they argued that the principal point of contact being the body, Rielly’s history of no supplemental discipline, and that Senators forward Ridly Greig wasn’t injured on the play were reasons to reduce the suspension. Bettman acknowledged that Rielly’s clean history and the lack of injury were already factored into the decision, suggesting that had this not been the case, the suspension almost certainly would have been considerably longer.
Meanwhile, the Maple Leafs argued that Greig’s actions (slapping the puck into the empty net in the dying seconds of the game) were provocative, an argument that Bettman felt was “utterly irrelevant”.
While Toronto has certainly missed Rielly at a time when their back end is already thinned out, his absence hasn’t hurt them in the standings as they’ve won all four games and will try to make it five on Wednesday. He’ll be eligible to return the following night against Vegas.
Joseph Woll Not Close To Returning
- Not playing since early December due to a high-ankle sprain, Toronto Maple Leafs goaltender Joseph Woll is not close to returning according to Jonas Siegel of The Athletic. In the meantime, the tandem of Ilya Samsonov and Martin Jones has produced a 16-10-4 record in his absence but has only managed a .891 save percentage.
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Maple Leafs Recall Marshall Rifai, Loan Dennis Hildeby To AHL
The Toronto Maple Leafs have recalled defenseman Marshall Rifai and sent goaltender Dennis Hildeby back to the AHL. This is just the second call-up of Rifai’s career, with the first coming in October of this season but not resulting in any NHL games. Instead, the 25-year-old defenseman has spent his season with the Toronto Marlies, playing in 34 games and scoring 11 points. He also ranks fourth on the team with 48 penalty minutes.
Rifai is in just his second professional season after playing three years at Harvard University. He earned a contract with the Maple Leafs this summer, after signing a professional try-out with the team at the end of the 2021-22 season. Rifai was persistent in his first AHL season, recording 16 points and a team-leading 118 penalty minutes across 69 games. He became just the sixth AHL rookie since the 2017-18 season to record 100 or more penalty minutes, joining a list led by Montana Onyebuchi‘s 137 penalty minutes in just 46 games in 2021-22.
Rifai will hope that his recall proves more fruitful than Dennis Hildeby’s. The 22-year-old goaltender has yet to make his NHL debut, despite spending a combined 16 days on the NHL roster this season. Hildeby has served as the Marlies’ go-to starter when he’s in the AHL, recording 12 wins and a .913 save percentage in 24 games. He’s proven much more reliable in net than backup Keith Petruzzelli, who’s recorded just six wins and a .868 save percentage in 16 games of his own. Hildeby will look to bring a spark back to a Marlies lineup that’s gone 2-4-0 over their last six games, getting outscored 19-to-26.
John Tavares Considered Day-To-Day
- The Toronto Maple Leafs will be without their captain tonight, as John Tavares is reportedly considered day-to-day with a minor injury (X Link). Taking a bit of a step back from his previous scoring pace in Toronto, Tavares still sits fifth on the team in scoring with 15 goals and 40 points in 51 games.
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Maple Leafs Offering Volume Of Picks To Try To Add Before Trade Deadline
With the Maple Leafs not having a second-round pick until 2027 and an anticipated unwillingness to move their first-round pick, their trade chips are certainly limited. Accordingly, Chris Johnston of The Athletic noted on a recent TSN Insider Trading segment that Toronto has gone with a volume approach when it comes to offering up draft picks for rentals; clearly, nothing has materialized in terms of an accepted trade yet. They have two extra fifth-round picks and an extra seventh-rounder among their nine selections in June so if they are indeed trying to move some of those extra picks, they’ll likely be forced to shop more towards the depth side of the trade market.
Maple Leafs Recall Maxime Lajoie
The Maple Leafs have brought up some extra depth on the back end before their game tonight against Anaheim as the team announced (Twitter link) that blueliner Maxime Lajoie has been recalled from AHL Toronto.
The 26-year-old has been shuffled back and forth twice already this month although it didn’t result in any playing time. Lajoie did play four games with the Maple Leafs earlier this season, getting held off the scoresheet while averaging just 9:32 per game. However, he has been productive in the minors with the Marlies, recording 17 points in 31 appearances so far. With 74 career NHL contests under his belt, Lajoie has been in the recallable depth role for the past few years now.
Toronto had a full 23-player roster before making this recall so there’s a corresponding roster move that hasn’t officially been announced yet. Speculatively, that could be blueliner Mark Giordano landing on the non-roster list following the death of his father; Lajoie would then need to be sent back down upon Giordano’s return to the team. While Morgan Rielly remains out as he continues to serve his suspension, the Maple Leafs don’t get an extra roster spot while he’s out of the lineup.