As has been expected for the last few weeks, the Maple Leafs have assigned defenseman Morgan Rielly to the Toronto Marlies of the AHL with the end of his junior season.
“He will join the Marlies this week on the road.” Leafs Assistant GM Dave Poulin indicated this morning on FAN 590’s Brady and Lang show.
According to Kyle Cicerella of Canadian Press, the first rounder is slated to join the Toronto Marlies in Chicago, where they take on the AHL Wolves on Friday night.
Rielly, who turned 19 last week, was selected fifth overall by Toronto in the 2012 Entry Draft and had a healthy and very successful year with the Moose Jaw Warriors of the WHL and as part of Team Canada at the World Juniors in Ufa, Russia.
After missing all but 18 games of the 2011-12 season with a serious knee injury, Rielly rebounded with 12 goals and 42 assists in 60 games for the Warriors.
There was a slight possibility that the Leafs, who were impressed with Rielly’s maturity and poise during the abbreviated training camp in late January, might bring him directly to the NHL, but that would kick in the first year of his entry-level contract if he played more than five games and would further complicat the blueline backlog with Jake Gardiner currently in the AHL and Mike Kostka and Mike Komisarek sitting in the press box.
Poulin stated that the determination of how Rielly is utilized for the balance of the season and AHL playoffs will be under the control of Marlies coach Dallas Eakins, but with Gardiner expected to be recalled and the possibility of trades involving a defenseman on the Leafs roster before the April 3rd trade deadline, it is likely that the offensively gifted blueliner will not be wanting for opportunity.
The Marlies began a seven game, twelve day road trip on Sunday with a 5-3 victory over the Lake Erie Monsters on Sunday and will face the Monsters again on Tuesday night. The first chance for Toronto fans to see Rielly in person will be on Saturday, March 30th against the Abbotsford Heat.
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The trade chatter around the NHL will undoubtedly pick up in intensity this week, as the GM’s will meet in Toronto on Wednesday, but things have been relatively quiet since there are a lot of teams still with the mindset of being in a race for the playoffs and not ready to sell off.
HNIC’s Elliotte Friedman mentioned on Saturday’s Hot Stove that the prices currently being demanded by the few sellers out there is ridiculous, but that may change with another two weeks of games determining whether more teams decide to join the selloff.
Hockeybuzz blogger John Jaeckel reports that Toronto scouts were seen at two Rockford IceHogs(Chicago’s AHL affiliate) - Chicago Wolves(Vancouver’s farm club) games over the weekend, which could be indicative of nothing or it could mean that they have particular interest in a young prospect. Jaeckel believes there is something afoot as former Habs GM Pierre Gauthier was in Toronto a few weeks ago and scouted the Leafs.
The Black Hawks do not have many weaknesses, as their 23-2-3 record would attest, but like any contending team they are looking for quality depth in preparation for a lengthy and arduous playoff run and could be in the market for Leafs pending unrestricted free agents Tyler Bozak or Clarke MacArthur if the price is right.
The other is a head scratcher, as the Toronto Star’s
Mark Zwolinski reports of rumors that Toronto has interest in Washington center Mike Ribeiro, who currently leads the Capitals with 31 points and is an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season.
Ribeiro is undoubtedly on the block and Washington is unlikely to be able make up the ground created by their slow start to get back into a playoff race, but why would Toronto be interested in an offensive center and free-agent-to-be when they already have Nazem Kadri and pending UFA Tyler Bozak. One possibility could be as a replacement for Bozak, if Leafs GM Dave Nonis trades him to a contender in the next few weeks, another could be if they want to keep and extend Bozak, which would make Mikhail Grabovski expendable.
It did not go unnoticed that Nikolai Kulemin, Dion Phaneuf and Cody Franson were utilized over Grabovski during the shootout against Winnipeg on Saturday.
Grabovski has only 11 points in 29 games and has been relegated to a checking role by Randy Carlyle. That lack of production for the forward making the most on the club is troublesome. With Ribeiro almost certainly not coming back to Washington next season, the Capitals might be interested in acquiring Grabovski to be the second line center behind Nicklas Backstrom.
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