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Leafs will be well represented at Beijing Olympics

February 3, 2021, 5:55 PM ET [202 Comments]
Mike Augello
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The news that Doug Armstrong as the general manager for Team Canada along with a staff that includes Ken Holland, Ron Francis, Roberto Luongo, and Don Sweeney serves as a reminder that the 2022 Beijing Olympics is just one year away. Although a lot can happen in 12 months, it appears that the Toronto Maple Leafs will have at least five players in the mix for their respective countries.




Auston Matthews is a no doubter for Team USA and will center one of their top two offensive lines and William Nylander should be picked for the Swedes.

Toronto should be well represented on the Canadian squad, as Mitch Marner and Morgan Rielly are likely selections at right wing and left defense. John Tavares has international experience in the Olympics, World Cup and World Championships, but he would probably have to shift to the wing as he did for the Sochi Olympics in 2014 to make the squad with Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon and Sidney Crosby taking up the top three center spots.

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The Leafs got another good day of practice in at the Ford Performance Centre in preparation for three straight against the Vancouver Canucks at Scotiabank Arena.

"It's been excellent, I'm really happy with the work that we've gotten (done) in the last two practice days for sure, but even the third day which was a more of a skills day for about half of our team." Leafs head coach Sheldon Keefe said on Wednesday. "The execution was good, the energy around the team was good, so that's very positive, but obviously we've got to bring it to the ice. We fully expect our team to take a step (after) having time to recover and rest a little bit, but also address some things in practice. We are expecting to be a better team when we hit the ice (on Thursday)."



Alex Kerfoot was back on the ice after not participating in practice on Tuesday and skated between Jimmy Vesey and Ilya Mikheyev. Wayne Simmonds remained on the second line with Tavares and Nylander, the top line of Zach Hyman, Matthews and Marner remained intact and Nic Petan appears to be slated for his first game of the season on the fourth line alongside Travis Boyd and Spezza.

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