Maple Leafs: Lupul takes recovery in stride, with a little help from skating coach
Joffrey Lupul has been as brittle as glass. But he was back at practice on Thursday eager to show that, with improvements in sports science, he’s finally built to last.
The talented forward has never played a full season with the Maple Leafs, and he has missed five games this year with an undisclosed lowerbody injury.
While the Leafs have missed his scoring touch — he has eight goals in 23 games, tied for second on the team — the 32-year-old Lupul could return Tuesday against Tampa Bay.
He was moving like the Lupul of old Thursday, even scoring a dazzling goal with a deke to the forehand side. But he also took an errant puck off his foot while standing in the corner. Lupul winced and shook it off.
Still, after about 15 minutes of practice, Lupul was nowhere to be found. It didn’t bode well. The mystery was solved when he was spotted on an adjacent rink with the team’s skating instructor, Barb Underhill.
Reporters joked that the 4-foot-11, former world champion figure skater is a tough taskmaster and Lupul might have preferred to skate under the direction of Babcock. Lupul, his face red and sweat dripping off his nose, laughed it off.
“She’s great,” he said. “I’ve worked with Barb for a long time. I was doing a couple of things to help my stride and hopefully it will make me a little bit more efficient with my stride when I come back.”
Lupul is clearly enjoying being back on the ice, and he’s paying tribute to the Leafs’ training staff, which was responsible for him coming out of a game late last month. He had been feeling discomfort for a while and would have kept playing through the injury had they not stepped in.
But the science of sport has improved to the point where the Leafs’ training staff now will make a preemptive strike and hold players out if they’re hurting rather than risk aggravating an injury.
“This has been the first time in my career where someone has come to me and said, ‘We think you should get off the ice,’ ” Lupul said. “Usually, you play until that injury happens.
“So hopefully, we avoided a major injury by taking a week off. These guys are doing a great job. I think it’s real forward thinking compared to the kind of old mentality of hockey.”
Babcock credited the team with having the best, most scientifically advanced training staff in the business. The medical team is headed by Dr. Jeremy Bettle, director of sports science and performance, who was hired in the summer. He spent four seasons as the strength and conditioning coach and director of nutrition for the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets.
“We’re in a situation here in Toronto that we should have the best sports science team in the league,” Babcock said. “We have all the resources and all the opportunity to maximize all that and be cutting edge.”
The results may not show up in the short term, the coach added, but the payoff will be visible over the long haul.
The players have the day off on Friday, but there will be no rest for Lupul. He will be back on the ice, sweating under Underhill’s direction.
Note: Goaltender Antoine Bibeau, 21, has been reassigned to the AHL’s Toronto Marlies. He has appeared in 10 games with the Marlies this season, with an 0.869 save percentage and a 3.64 goals against average.