Leafs Recall Gunnarsson and Assign Rosehill to Marlies

November 12, 2009

Brian Burke, president and general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs, announced Thursday that defenceman Carl Gunnarsson has been recalled from the Toronto Marlies of the American Hockey League. The Maple Leafs also announced that forward Jay Rosehill has been assigned to the Marlies on a conditioning loan, and defenceman Mike Komisarek has been placed on Injured Reserve and will miss approximately three weeks due to a quadriceps injury.

Gunnarsson, 23, registered two assists with two penalty minutes in 12 games with the Marlies this season. The 6-2, 196-pound defenceman is playing in his first professional season in North America after collecting 29 points (10 goals, 19 assists) and 60 penalty minutes in 150 games over four seasons (2005-06 to 2008-09) with Linkoping HC of the Swedish Elite League. Gunnarsson was Toronto’s seventh choice, 189th overall, in the 2007 Entry Draft.

Rosehill, 24, appeared in six games with the Maple Leafs this season, registering a goal and 16 penalty minutes. The 6-3, 215-pound winger made his NHL debut on October 1 versus Montreal and scored his first NHL goal October 10 against Pittsburgh.

The Marlies continue their six game road trip when they travel to Winnipeg to take on the Manitoba Moose, AHL affiliate of the Vancouver Canucks, on Friday night at 8:30 p.m. (ET). For 2009-10 Marlies ticket information, including season ticket packages and group seats, visit www.torontomarlies.com or call the team’s ticket line at 416-597-PUCK.

Tlusty recalled from Marlies

The Maple Leafs have recalled forward Jiri Tlusty from the Toronto Marlies of the AHL, the team announced on Friday. Tlusty has two assists in five games with the Marlies so far this sesaon.

Tlusty had played in seven games with the Leafs in October before being sent to the club’s farm team.

The recall comes as a result of a shoulder injury suffered by the Leafs’ John Mitchell in Thursday’s loss to Boston.

It’s official – Schenn to remain with Leafs

Multiple news sources are reporting that Toronto Maple Leafs head coach, Ron Wilson, sat down with Luke Schenn after Monday’s team practice to give him some good news and some bad news.

The bad news? Luke would have to move out of the Toronto area hotel he’s been staying in for the last month or so. The young Leaf prospect would no longer be able to order room service or have nice clean linen every day.

The good? The reason for his eviction is that he needs to retain a real estate agent to help him find new, permanent digs in the city because he’s sticking with the club.

Schenn will suit up for his 9th regular season game as a Maple Leaf tomorrow when his team hosts the Tampa Bay Lightning. After the game, the team flies to New Jersey to face Brodeur and the Devils on Wednesday night. The second the clock starts ticking, Schenn’s entry level SPC will kick in for the full season. Should he remain with the club beyond the 41 game mark — and there’s little reason to suspect otherwise — it will also count as a full year of service toward Schenn’s status as a player. Assuming he remains healthy and assigned to the club, he would be eligible for unrestricted free agency at age 25.

Schenn came into training camp considered by most to be very unlikely to cement a roster spot. After all, to earn that spot he would have to prove himself worthy of top-4 ice time, and that would not be easy with the Leafs roster already chock full of defencemen with NHL experience. Anything less, and Schenn would be sent back for one more year of Junior hockey with the Kelowna Rockets.

“Lockdown Luke,” as he has affectionately come to be known on the TMLfans forum, has met and exceeded all expectations. He has averaged more than 20 minutes per night of ice time and has seen regular duty as a top-pairing partner for Tomas Kaberle, as well as a prominent role on the team’s penalty killing unit. He has also been entrusted to hold the lead in the closing minutes of many of the Leafs’ recent games.

For more information, read the official Leafs announcement or join in on our forum discussion of this promising Leaf rookie.

McCabe deal made official

The much anticipated trade of defenceman Bryan McCabe was finalized on Tuesday.

McCabe has been dealt from the Leafs to the Florida Panthers in exchange for Mike Van Ryn. Florida also receives Toronto’s fourth-round draft pick in 2010.

McCabe’s salary cap hit for the next three seasons will be $5.75 million even though the Panthers will only have to pay him $4.15 million per season on the deal that was front-loaded when it was signed in 2006.

29-year old Van Ryn, who is four years younger than McCabe, has two years remaining on his contract and will earn $3.35 million each season, but his cap hit is only $2.9 million.

Links: TSN.ca | TMLfans.ca discussion

Player Profile: Vesa Toskala

TMLfans Members’ Scouting Report

Vesa Toskala was the San Jose Sharks’ 4th round (90th overall) selection in the 1995 NHL Entry draft and is yet another in a line of highly talented goaltenders to come through their system under the watchful eye of Warren Strelow.

Strelow, who passed away in April 2007, was the highly regarded goaltending coach who has also been credited (at least in part) with the successful development of Mikka Kiprusoff (later traded to the Flames) and Evgeny Nobokov (the Sharks’ current #1 goalie). When with the Devils, he also worked extensively with future Hall of Famer Martin Brodeur.

Toskala is a late-bloomer and did not begin to play regularly in the NHL until the 2005-06 season. He spent his first four post-draft years honing his craft in his native Finland, then a year in the SEL, and then finally a couple of years in the Sharks’ farm system before being called up as Nabokov’s backup.

Vesa is a butterfly style goalie with extremely sharp reflexes, a lightning-fast glove hand, and very good rebound control. He makes up for his smaller stature with exceptionally quick lateral movement, although on occasion he will over-commit to the shooter and find himself out of position for a rebound. Fortunately, his sheer athleticism will often allow him to recover in time to make a spectacular, acrobatic save. He has a reputation for never giving up on a puck.

Vesa is an excellent skater and increasingly proficient puck-handler (he scored a goal in the SEL and has averaged nearly one assist in every ten games in the last two seasons). It is an area of his game that he continues to work hard on in an effort to provide additional support for his defencemen.

Having gained a spot as the Sharks’ back-up goaltender in the 2005-06 season, Toskala proceeded to mount a charge on #1 goalie Evgeni Nabokov. An early spring injury to Nabokov and stellar play from Toskala saw him take over the starter’s role in the ‘06 playoffs where he sported a sterling .910 SV% and 2.45GAA (including one shut-out) but the team was bounced in the 2nd round by that year’s Cinderella team, the Edmonton Oilers.

In the subsequent season he spit the goaltending duties with Nabokov until an early spring groin injury forced him out of the line-up. Nabokov’s play improved during Vesa’s enforced layoff and was strong enough that he would be pegged to lead the Sharks into that year’s playoffs (where they were narrowly defeated in the 2nd round by the Red Wings).

With Nabokov earning a $5M salary on a long term contract and the much lower priced Toskala only a year away from the end of his final RFA deal and a huge pay increase, Vesa was the victim of the numbers game when the Sharks elected to trade him to the Maple Leafs — along with under-performing forward Mark Bell — on the eve of the 2007 NHL Entry draft in exchange for the Leafs’ 1st and 2nd round draft picks, as well as a 2009 5th round pick.

Vesa was John Ferguson Jr’s second attempt to resolve Toronto’s woes between the pipes. In the previous season, the Leafs’ GM had traded one of the franchise’s two top goaltending prospects, Tuukka Rask, to the Bruins in exchange for former Calder-winner Andrew Raycroft. Raycroft played the lion’s share of the games for the Leafs in the 2006-07 season — including posting a new team record for wins in a single season — but there were serious concerns with his propensity to give up very soft goals at the most inopportune moments, as well as with his poor save percentage and goals-against average.

Toskala’s first few months with the Leafs saw him share the goaltending duties evenly with Raycroft, in part because the Finn initially struggled to adjust (as most goaltenders do) to the shooters in his new Eastern Conference, and to learn to work with his defence corps that was also struggling and beset with injuries. However, by early December Toskala had adapted well enough to the team and conference that he was already clearly the better goaltender and had captured the #1 role on the team.

The Leafs did well for the following six weeks until a groin strain knocked Vesa out of the line-up…at which point a terrible string of losses with Raycroft (and even Clemmensen!) in net all but eliminated the Blue & White from playoff contention. Upon Toskala’s return, the team surged back into the hunt and played exceptionally well for the final 20 or 30 games of the season, only narrowly missing the cut.

With Toskala having firmly establishd himself as the #1 goaltender for the Leafs, interim Leafs GM Cliff Fletcher bought out the remaining year of Raycroft’s contract, signed UFA veteran goaltender Curtis Joseph top a one-year deal as a back-up, and appears perfectly happy to go forward with Vesa as his undisputed starter — at least until Justin Pogge is able to establish himself.

Many TMLfans members consider Toskala to be within the top 10 current NHL goaltenders and one of the most valuable assets that the Leafs possess. This has led to an interesting division of opinion in forum discussions. Some feel that the Leafs should hold on to Toskala since a team cannot ever become a serious contender without elite level goaltending. Others feel that by virtue of his play, he will single-handedly improve the Leafs’ results in the upcoming season and thus hamper any chances the team might have of landing one of the highly desirable top draft picks in the 2009 Entry draft. That, in conjunction with the expected high return that could be had for him in a trade, has some fans urging the Leafs to move him as part of their rebuilding process.

Member-Recommended Links

Our members recommend the following images and clips:

• A YouTube highlight real from the 2007-08 season.
• Another YouTube tribute, with lots of great highlights and some photos.
• Vesa absolutely robs Brett McLean of the Panthers.
• Vesa absolutely robs Jason Arnott of the Preds. The save is at the 4:30 mark of the clip, but the entire video includes some outstanding saves.
• Vesa absolute robs Shane Doan of the Coyotes.
• Vesa absolutely robs Brandon Bochenski of the Ducks.
• Vesa robs pretty much everyone on the Lightning roster…and showcases some rarely-seen double-pad slides!
• Vesa makes yet another amazing reaction save.
• Vesa scores a goal during SEL play.
• A fun piece on Vesa’s fashion sense.
• Vesa likes to kid around a bit during post-game interviews (at the 5:00 mark of this clip)

Forum Thread

Join our forum discussion on this player.

Career Stats

Leafs Luke Schenn and Chris Didomenico to attend Canada’s Junior development camp

Next week’s summer development camp for Canada’s World Junior Team hopefulls will include a pair of Leafs.

Defenceman Luke Schenn, the Leafs’ 1st round (#5 overall) draft selection in June’s NHL entry draft, won gold with the team in the 2008 Championship and posted a team-high +5, will almost certainly make the final roster.

Chris Didomenico was drafted in the 6th round (164 overall) by the Leafs in the 2007 Entry draft and will be hoping to make his first appearance for his country — though admittedly his chances are relatively slim considerring some of the elite forward talent who will be vying for spots.

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