The Toronto Maple Leafs revealed they have listed John Tavares as week-to-week as they monitor his injury status after he left Thursday's game against Buffalo.
On Saturday, the Maple Leafs got some unfortunate news as they were forced to announce that former captain and veteran pivot John Tavares would be out for the next little bit with a lower-body injury.
Tavares out week-to-week with a lower-body injury
The team has internally listed Tavares as 'week-to-week', with that designation giving him an absence of up to six weeks per Jonas Siegel:
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That would put Tavares' potential return as late as the end of November, which is a huge loss for the Maple Leafs, and the hope is that Tavares' ironman nature comes through and he can recover sooner.
Tavares, 35, has seven points in eight games so far this season, and has been one of the early catalysts of Toronto's offense. He's also been crucial to the development of Gavin McKenna, and it will be interesting to see how the Maple Leafs decide to shuffle the lines for the next few weeks.
How will the Maple Leafs function without Tavares?
We may see something akin to what the team put out against the Colorado Avalanche where they had Tavares out due to the birth of his child, where Nick Paul took over 2C duties, but Jim Hiller will likely make changes depending on how he sees fit.
For now though, Toronto is now looking at a future without John Tavares, and that's not good for their early season push, especially after such a mediocre start.
There is also the question of how the locker room is going to be, especially during tough times. Tavares was the wise sage who was willing to offer advice, calm the room, and be a respected voice who commanded attention. Without that, the team loses a lot of the glue that holds them together - much like Chris Tanev.
Tavares' offense will be sorely missed, and it puts a new light on Toronto's bottom-six to actually start producing, and if not, then perhaps find a new solution somewhere because now the team is down a key asset for over a month.
Jim Hiller has his work cut out for him, and right now the Maple Leafs face an uphill battle without their battle-torn warrior leading the way.
Do you think the Maple Leafs will do better or worse without John Tavares?
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