Auston Matthews status for Leafs' final game revealed

It appears that Auston Matthews will get one final shot at 70 goals as he did not skate this morning, indicating he will play.

The Leafs took to the ice today for a very optional game-day skate ahead of their season finale tonight against the Tampa Bay Lightning. As TSN's Mark Masters reported, Morgan Rielly, Joel Edmundson and Jake McCabe all skated, indicating that they will not be playing tonight. In place of Rielly, Edmundson and McCabe, it is likely that we see Mark Giordano, TJ Brodie and Conor Timmins, all of whom were scratched for yesterday's game, in the lineup tonight.

Masters also noted that in a typical back-to-back situation, those playing don't skate. None of the 12 forwards that played for the Leafs last night took to the ice this morning indicating that Matthews will continue his hunt for goal 70.

Matthews had five shots on goal in just under 20 minutes of ice-time last night, but was a minus-3 and saw his eight-game goal scoring streak snapped after hitting a post and having a number of other close calls in tight. It comes as a bit of a surprise that he is playing tonight given that the Leafs want to enter the playoffs as healthy as possible, but we could see his minutes limited to powerplay time and a handful of even strength shifts per period.


According to https://www.hockey-reference.com/, in the three games against the Lightning this season, Matthews has 3 goals and four points. In 21 regular season games, he has 12 goals and 25 points against the Bolts and with Matt Tomkins in net instead of Andrei Vasilevksiy, he has every opportunity to join the 70-goal club.