{"id":534788,"date":"2026-03-14T00:20:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T00:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/534788\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T00:20:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T00:20:10","slug":"matthews-out-for-season-for-maple-leafs-with-grade-3-mcl-tear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/534788\/","title":{"rendered":"Matthews out for season for Maple Leafs with grade 3 MCL tear"},"content":{"rendered":"

TORONTO — Auston Matthews<\/a>\u00a0will be out for the rest of the regular season for the Toronto Maple Leafs because of a grade 3 MCL tear and quad contusion in his left leg.<\/p>\n

The 28-year-old forward will be reevaluated in two weeks, when a further update will be provided.<\/p>\n

Matthews sustained the injury in a knee-on-knee collision with defenseman Radko Gudas in a 6-4 win against the Anaheim Ducks<\/a> at Scotiabank Arena on Thursday. He crumpled to the ice when he tried to sidestep the hit in the slot from Gudas, who was assessed a major penalty for kneeing and a game misconduct at 15:47 of the second period. Matthews was helped off the ice by a trainer and teammate Brandon Carlo<\/a>, putting minimal weight on his left leg.<\/p>\n

Gudas had a hearing with the NHL Department of Player Safety on Friday for kneeing.<\/p>\n

As much as Toronto coach Craig Berube was perturbed by Gudas’ actions, he also was irked by his team’s lack of a response in that moment. None of Toronto’s other four skaters on the ice, forwards William Nylander<\/a> and rookie Easton Cowan<\/a>, and defensemen Morgan Rielly<\/a>\u00a0and Carlo, confronted Gudas while their captain was writhing in pain on the ice.<\/p>\n

When asked if he had an explanation as to why his players did not immediately react in that situation, Berube replied: “No. Obviously, we should have four guys in there doing something about it, but it didn’t happen.”<\/p>\n

It was a heated topic between the coach and his players in Toronto’s dressing room during the second intermission, a number of Maple Leafs said. That exchange then sparked an emotional final 20 minutes of physical play in which Toronto outscored Anaheim 3-1 to end an eight-game skid (0-6-2).<\/p>\n

“I thought we responded in the third. A good response there,” Berube said. “But we all would have liked everyone to get in there right away.”<\/p>\n

Rielly, in particular, took accountability for his inaction at the time of the incident.<\/p>\n

“I didn’t have a good view of it just because the puck was going the other way,” he said. “But it’s on me for not responding earlier to Gudas. Obviously it’s a dirty hit. I didn’t understand how bad he got him in the moment, but I take full responsibility for not being the first one in there or not being in there quicker to respond.<\/p>\n

“That being said, I thought our group played well in the third and ultimately was able to respond. But, ultimately, when your captain goes down like that on a dirty play, you have to respond as a group. But I also take responsibility for not being the first one in there after the hit.”<\/p>\n

Ducks coach Joel Quenneville said he did not think Gudas’ hit on Matthews was intentional.<\/p>\n

“There\u2019s no premeditation. It was a reflex action,” Quenneville said.<\/p>\n

Prior to the hit, Matthews scored a power-play goal at 10:47 of the second period to cut Toronto’s deficit to 3-2. It was his first goal since Jan. 27, ending a 12-game drought.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO — Auston Matthews\u00a0will be out for the rest of the regular season for the Toronto Maple Leafs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":532844,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":["post-534788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=534788"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534788\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/532844"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=534788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=534788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=534788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}