Official Update on Morgan Rielly Not Good News for the Maple Leafs

It's been a rough couple of days for the Toronto Maple Leafs as they are expected to be without two of their top defensemen heading into Friday's tilt in Buffalo against the Sabres, according to head coach Craig Berube.

The veteran bench boss confirmed that Morgan Rielly will be joining Chris Tanev on the sidelines. Rielly status was in question when he skated on his own yesterday after having sustained an undisclosed injury on Tuesday night.

The longest-tenured Maple Leaf was enjoying a solid start to the season with 2 goals and 6 points in his first 7 games to go along with 22:11 ATOI. With Tanev having been placed on the injured reserve, Rielly was expected to play a larger role alongside Brandon Carlo and Jake McCabe.

Now, with Rielly sidelined, the Maple Leafs will have to roll with Philippe Myers and Dakota Mermis, who was recently called up from the AHL, to take their spots in the lineup.

Coming out of Tuesday's game, Tanev was expected to miss an extended period of time, which prompted Berube to pair Myers with Oliver Ekman-Larsson in practice. With Rielly now out of the lineup, the Leafs reconfigured their pairs once more, having Myers paired up with Simon Benoit and Mermis with Ekman-Larsson.

The extent of Rielly's injury is unknown, but it could be a cause for concern since the Leafs play again tomorrow night to complete the home-and-home series with Buffalo. They do have a few days off until Tuesday's contest against Calgary, but that's the first leg of another back to back series.

Nevertheless, it will be interesting to see how the defense fares tonight in Buffalo. The Sabres have won 3 of their last 4 games, while outscoring their opponents 17-10 in that span, which should provide the makeshift defensive corps with a pretty solid challenge right out of the gates.