Toronto Maple Leafs center Auston Matthews will miss at least three weeks with a sprained knee.

The team announced the reigning MVP’s anticipated absence Friday, two days after Matthews was injured in Toronto’s victory against the New York Rangers.

Matthews is expected to miss at least six games and could be out for a few more. The timing of the injury coinciding with the NHL All-Star break and the Maple Leafs bye week prevents this from costing Matthews more time out of the lineup.

After being voted an All-Star by fans, Matthews is now out of the event scheduled for Feb. 3-4 in Sunrise, Florida. The league announced Aleskander Barkov from the host Florida Panthers will take Matthews’ place on the Atlantic Division All-Star roster.

Matthews, who won the Hart Trophy last season after leading the NHL with 60 goals, has 53 points in 47 games this season.

KRAKEN: Seattle rookie All-Star Matty Beniers will miss the team’s final two games before the All-Star break after taking a big hit from Vancouver’s Tyler Myers earlier this week.

Seattle Coach Dave Hakstol said that Beniers would not play Friday night against Calgary or Saturday against Columbus. Hakstol did not speculate on Beniers’ availability for next weekend’s All-Star Game in Florida.

The team has not specified what kind of injury Beniers sustained from the hit. He was barreled over by Myers away from the play early in the second period in Wednesday’s 6-1 victory over Vancouver. Myers was penalized for interference on the play. Beniers returned briefly for one shift later in the period but did not play in the third period.

CANADIENS: Montreal winger Cole Caufield said he wouldn’t be having season-ending surgery on his right shoulder if the team were in playoff contention.

But with the Canadiens near the bottom of the Eastern Conference standings, the 22-year-old Caufield said he decided to have the surgery to protect his long-term health. The procedure is scheduled to be performed by Dr. Peter Millett on Wednesday.

“I didn’t want to stop playing,” Caufield said. “I had a couple tests done to look at it more clearly but, in the end, like it could’ve been one more fall and it could have been even worse.”

Caufield, who leads the Canadiens with 26 goals in 46 games, had three different medical opinions on his shoulder before concluding that his season was over.

“I think they’ve seen a lot more than I have and they know the differences and what they like or don’t like about it,” he said about the medical opinions. “Long term, I think this is what’s best but for sure it was tough to sit out that game against Toronto on Saturday night.”

Caufield initially felt the injury in an awkward fall during Montreal’s 4-2 loss at Dallas on Dec. 23. He said his right shoulder popped, and he replaced it himself.

FRIDAY’S GAMES

ISLANDERS 2, RED WINGS 0: Ilya Sorokin made 23 saves and Brock Nelson had a goal and an assist, leading New York to a victory against visiting Detroit.

Anders Lee also scored and Kyle Palmieri had two assists, helping New York stop a six-game slide. It was Sorokin’s fourth shutout of the season and No. 14 for his career.

Detroit had won two in a row. Magnus Hellberg made 26 stops for the Red Wings in their final game before their bye week ahead of the NHL All-Star break.

Lee opened the scoring 4:44 into the second period, redirecting the puck past Hellberg for his 18th goal of the season. He also became the 16th player in franchise history to reach 400 points.

New York improved to 16-7-2 when scoring the first goal.

RANGERS 4, GOLDEN KNIGHTS 1: Vincent Trochek had a goal and an assist, Jaroslav Halak stopped 33 shots and New York won at home.

Chris Kreider, Filip Chytil and Jimmy Vesey also scored for the Rangers, who are 8-2-3 in their last 13 games heading into their bye week and All-Star break. Braden Schneider had two assists and Halak won his fifth straight start.

Phil Kessel had a goal for Vegas and Adin Hill finished with 36 saves. The Golden Knights lost for the seventh time in nine games (2-6-1).

HURRICANES 5, SHARKS 4: Martin Necas scored late in regulation and again in overtime, Carolina won in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Necas tied it at 4 when he got his 20th goal of the season with 11.5 seconds left in the third period. Then he beat James Reimer again 55 seconds into overtime.

Sebastian Aho also had two goals for the Hurricanes in their fourth consecutive victory. Andrei Svechnikov assisted on each of Necas’ goals.

Calvin de Haan scored for Carolina in the first, and Antti Raanta made 26 stops in his first start since Jan. 7.

Oskar Lindblom, Nick Bonino, Michael Eyssimont and Mario Ferraro scored for San Jose, which has lost four in a row. Reimer stopped 31 shots against one of his former teams.

SENATORS 6, MAPLE LEAFS 2: Brady Tkachuk scored twice, Anton Forsberg made 31 saves and Ottawa won in Toronto.

Claude Giroux had a goal and an assist, and Thomas Chabot, Drake Batherson and Derick Brassard also scored for the Senators, who won at Scotiabank Arena with fans in attendance for the first time since October 2018. Tim Stutzle added two assists.

William Nylander and Joey Anderson scored for Toronto, which was without Auston Matthews because of a sprained knee that will keep the star center out at least three weeks.

KINGS 4, PANTHERS 3: Adrian Kempe had a short-handed goal and an assist, Pheonix Copley made 41 saves and Los Angeles held on to win in Sunrise, Florida.

Anze Kopitar, Viktor Arvidsson and Matt Roy also scored for the Kings, who led 3-0 midway through the second period.

Ryan Lomberg and Brandon Montour scored in the second to get the Panthers within 3-2, but Roy’s late empty-netter sealed Florida’s third straight loss.

Carter Verhaeghe added an empty-netter for the Panthers and Alex Lyon had 27 saves while making his fourth consecutive start in place of the injured Sergei Bobrovsky.

Copy the Story Link