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Maple Leafs defenceman Tomas Kaberle had an X-ray done on his injured right hand yesterday and is expected to be out from 10 days to two weeks. Kaberle broke his right hand earlier in the season and missed 13 games before returning last Saturday for a game in Ottawa against the Senators. He injured the hand again in Tuesday's 3-2 overtime loss to the New Jersey Devils at the Air Canada Centre.
PLAYER MOVES
The Leafs assigned rookie forward Tim Stapleton to the Toronto Marlies yesterday. Stapleton played three games for Toronto, scoring one goal. He also netted the club's winner in a 5-4 shootout win over the New York Islanders on Feb. 26. Rookie defenceman Jonas Frogren was going to be send to the minors yesterday with the acquisition of Erik Reitz off waivers from the New York Rangers, but Reitz has an ankle injury and will not be ready to play tonight in Washington.
Forward Niklas Hagman, who has 19 goals and 18 assists in 58 games for Toronto this year, is recovering from a head injury but is expected back for Saturday's game at the ACC against the Edmonton Oilers.
WILD LINES STUFF
There were some interesting line combinations at practice yesterday and only three lines with the trading of forwards Nik Antropov and Dominic Moore:
Matt Stajan between Alexei Ponikarovsky and Boyd Devereaux.
Mikhail Grabovski between Lee Stempniak and Nikolai Kulemin.
John Mitchell between Jason Blake, Jamal Mayers and Brad May, a four man unit.
REAL HUMAN EMOTION
Leafs GM Brian Burke issued an apology to Vesa Toskala, whom he criticized publically earlier in the season for not practising hard enough. Burke was under the impression that the Leafs coaching staff had spoken to the goalie about his work ethic in practice .
"His impression was that he hadn't been told that (by the coaches)," Burke said. "So I said: 'If that's the first you've heard of this, then I apologize', (though) it's certainly not the story I've been told as far as what the coaches said to him."
