As The Hockey News' David Alter had reported on Friday, Marner and teammate Pierre Engvall were cleared in time to play in Arizona on Wednesday, but that would have left them next to no time to squeeze in a practice before hand.
All in all, the team just felt that Saturday was the better option to have the pair of forwards return. Marner echoed those sentiments following Friday's practice in Arizona before the Leafs travelled to St. Louis.
"It wouldn't have been the right to do, playing last game but I was open to doing that as well. I'm just excited to be back and I'm good to go," said the gifted playmaker.
Marner returned to his usual spot at practice on Friday, alongside Auston Matthews and Michael Bunting on the Leafs' top line and also took reps on the team's top power play unit. Marner apparently had good legs in his return to practice, so much so that Auston Matthews took notice.
"He looked good, had a lot of pep and a lot of energy," Matthews said following practice. "It's never easy to just pop back in and start going again with the time off, but if anyone can kind of bounce back and be as much of himself as possible, it's definitely him."
The timing couldn't be better for the Leafs, who lost a trio of players on Friday when Nick Ritchie, Ondrej Kase and Justin Holl were added to COVID-19 protocol.
