Joseph Woll is about to enter uncharted territory.
Given where he has been this season, there should be few concerns about what lies ahead for the Maple Leafs goaltender.
Woll’s next start, presumably against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Monday night at Scotiabank Arena, will be his 24th of the season, moving him one past the career-high of 23 he set in 2023-24. And Woll’s next game will be his 25th, equalling the number of games he played in a year ago.
As Anthony Stolarz continues to recover from undergoing a knee procedure on Dec. 18, Woll has been providing the kind of goaltending that teams require to win. In 12 games since Stolarz went under the knife, Woll has a record of 8-4-0 with a .913 save percentage at five-on-five.
In short, Woll has been handling an increased workload with relative comfort and the Leafs are better off for it.
“He is standing tall,” Leafs coach Craig Berube said to media in Montreal on Saturday night after the Leafs crushed the Canadiens 7-3. “He is doing a good job for us in all areas.”
Against the Canadiens, that included several saves of the acrobatic variety. Technically, Woll is sound, and when the situation calls for his athletic side to be revealed, he can be just as effective.
Not that the Leafs are prone to giving players a green light to return before they are fully ready, but there hasn’t been a reason to consider that idea for Stolarz with the manner in which Woll has been playing. Stolarz has been back on the ice, and we should have a clearer idea this week of his eventual return.
The key for the Leafs is they avoid overusing Woll, though they’ve finally been getting some relief in their schedule. There’s not another back-to-back set until after the 4 Nations Face-Off tournament, on Feb. 22-23, against Carolina and Chicago respectively.
Some wondered, before this season, how Woll would respond if he had to start the majority of games in the event that Stolarz might get injured.
Well, we’re finding out now. So far for the 26-year-old Woll, so good.
OEL RINGS ’EM UP
We wouldn’t want to overlook the contribution of Oliver Ekman-Larsson in Montreal, as the veteran defenceman recorded his first three-point game (one goal and two assists) in nearly three years.
It was just the second three-point game by a Leafs defenceman this season — Morgan Rielly had three points on Nov. 5 against the Boston Bruins — and it wouldn’t bother Berube if the Leafs D corps started to contribute on offence a little more regularly.
The Leafs have been getting more of that, but their 11 goals by D-men were tied for fewest in the NHL with the New York Rangers before the Rangers played at Montreal on Sunday night. And Toronto’s 80 points by defencemen was 22nd in the NHL.
“It was good to see our D shooting pucks, getting things to the net, keeping pucks alive in the offensive zone,” Berube said in Montreal. “We have to continue to do that.”
Ekman-Larsson previously had three points in a game on Feb. 8, 2022, for the Vancouver Canucks against the Arizona Coyotes. His career high is four, set with Arizona against Edmonton in January 2016.
“It’s nice, but I don’t really look at points, I try to help the team in any way I can,” Ekman-Larsson said after the Leafs blew out the Canadiens.
Berube’s system doesn’t necessarily call for, or rely on, scoring from the blue-line crew.
Starting with Rielly — who must sort out his game at both ends of the ice — though, the Leafs defencemen are capable of more.
Having said this, we’re curious to see what becomes of defenceman John Klingberg with the Edmonton Oilers, considering the Leafs’ reported interest.
Klingberg didn’t make much of a puck-moving impact in 14 games with the Leafs last season before undergoing season-ending hip surgery. Perhaps Klingberg could have added some offensive juice for Toronto, but at a glance, he’s not a Berube type. We’re not sure another look in Toronto would have been a good fit.
LOOSE LEAFS
The Leafs’ seven unanswered goals against the Canadiens were the most unanswered they’ve had in a game since a 7-0 win against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Dec. 16, 2023 … The Leafs scored two shorthanded goals in a game for the first time since March 23, 2022, when Ilya Mikheyev and Pierre Engvall scored shorthanded in a 3-2 win against the New Jersey Devils. The two shorthanded goals versus Montreal doubled the Leafs’ total in that category this season … William Nylander’s seven shots on goal in Montreal tied his season-high. He has reached that number in five games, including twice against the Canadiens … Of Nick Robertson’s eight goals, seven have been scored on the road. His only goal in Toronto this season, so far, was on Dec. 15 against the Buffalo Sabres.