Maple Leafs confirm bad news for Kirill Marchenko and call up his replacement

The Toronto Maple Leafs officially announced Kirill Marchenko's injury timeline while also bringing up Dakota Joshua from his conditioning stint with the Marlies.

Although Kirill Marchenko was seemingly optimistic with his injury, giving Maple Leafs fans a timeline of two weeks, it seems team wants to play things a bit more cautiously as they announced the forward is week-to-week instead of nailing down a specific time frame:

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However, this timeline does line up with his statement, as a week-to-week label means it can be anywhere from one to six weeks.

Toronto loses Marchenko but gains Joshua in latest roster move

The team also made another move by calling up Dakota Joshua from the Toronto Marlies as his replacement even temporarily. Joshua had been with the Marlies on a conditioning stint after suffering a core injury that kept him out of the lineup to start the year.

Marchenko, 26, has been lights out this season with 14 points in 14 games and being a key part of the Maple Leafs' top-six dominance through the early part of the season.

Joshua's inclusion in the lineup should be interesting, as it seems to facilitate that Gavin McKenna will move up to the second line in place of Marchenko while Joshua joins the more rugged line of Vinni Lettieri and Colton Sissons.

Also to note, Chris Tanev seems to be nearing a return as well as his status was upgraded to day-to-day, and seems to confirms reports that he could play Saturday against Vancouver.

Maple Leafs dodged a bullet with Marchenko's timeline

Although it still hurts the offense a ton that they are going to lose Marchenko for a spell, it could be a lot worse. The fact that he himself was optimistic about it being two weeks, and that falling into their prospective return date - it's a huge bullet dodged.

If he was out for six weeks or more, alongside Tavares' long-time absence, it would rob the Maple Leafs of two of their high-profile scoring pieces at a time they absolutely need them most.

Practice saw McKenna joining the top line, so it seems at least for the interim the Maple Leafs have a plan without him but it can't be overstated how good he's been and just how much everyone else needs to band together to cover for losing him.

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