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TSN Toronto reporter Mark Masters checks in with news and notes from Maple Leafs practices and game-day skates. The Maple Leafs practised Friday without Mitch Marner, who is day-to-day with an upper-body injury.

* "Mitch Marner is day-to-day," Mike Babcock announced as he walked into the middle of a group of reporters following Friday's practice. "So, that means tomorrow we'll talk about it again. How's that? And the next day we'll talk about it again." That elicited laughs from the assembled media. "Do we ever get an off day?" Babcock asked. "If we do, we won't talk about it that day." The head coach has made it clear in the past that discussing injury timelines is far from his favourite topic. Predictability, there wasn't much of an update on Friday. "(Nikita Soshnikov) was ready to go and it was time to get in anyway," Babcock quipped when asked about his mindset with Toronto's leading scorer dealing with an injury issue. 

Soshnikov, who missed three games with his own upper-body issue before sitting as a healthy scratch on Wednesday, will draw into the lineup if Marner can't play on Saturday. Kristen Shilton has a full report on Marner's status and how it will impact the lineup here.

* With Marner hurting, James van Riemsdyk will need to step up. The left winger has just one assist in the last six games and saw his ice time get cut during Wednesday's loss in Columbus. What message was Babcock sending? "We weren't playing very good. He's a guy who's a veteran leader, we need him to be good," the coach explained. "I think we were down 3-0, weren't we? So whatever we were doing wasn't going so good so I think you're entitled to change. The other thing is, you earn your ice time, it's real simple so when you play good you get more and when you don't play as good you get less." The New Jersey native logged just 12:51 of ice time against the Blue Jackets, a sharp decline from his season average of 15:42. The only other time van Riemsdyk played fewer than 13 minutes this season was in the 7-0 thrashing by the Kings back on Nov. 8. But Babcock doesn't believe van Riemsdyk is trending in the wrong direction. "Well, I don't think he hasn't been getting opportunities," Babcock said. "I didn't like a whole bunch of guys last game so I wouldn't worry about that. He has to get back to work just like everybody else. We got to grind and compete and be at the net and get some second chances." 

Was JVR motivated by the brief benching? "You don't need any motivation this time of year," he said. "My approach remains the same: show up every day at practice and try to get better and try and help the team win games. My approach stays the same no matter what." He insists he's not concerned about what happened on Wednesday. "I just focus on what I can control and that's having a good work ethic, a good attitude," van Riemsdyk said. "I know I'm a guy who's relied upon on this team for offence, in particular, and to play the right way so I'm just trying to do that every single day." The 27-year-old's possession numbers have dipped lately. His CorsiFor% has been sub 46% in three of the last four games. It cratered to 33% against Columbus. He understands the pressure is on. "You want to be productive, especially at times when we're not picking up as many points as a team in the standings," van Riemsdyk acknowledged. "You want to find ways to try and help out more, contribute more so, certainly as an offensive guy, you want to be scoring and helping the team win games." So, that said, what went wrong on Wednesday? "I don't think we executed well enough. We were turning pucks over quite a bit and we seemed to get hemmed in our own end."

Marner has been credited with driving his line despite playing with veterans van Riemsdyk and Tyler Bozak. But van Riemsdyk expects the line can be effective if Connor Brown replaces Marner as was the case at Friday's practice. "I remember I actually played with (Brown) in his first training camp," van Riemsdyk said. "I think it was me, him and Trevor Smith and you could even tell then, his hockey sense and the things he could do around the rink, that he could play at this level and be productive at this level and he's come in and done all those things. He's a really smart player, fast, makes the right play every time and he's really good on the forecheck." Brown has just one goal and three assists in the last 15 games while playing mostly with Auston Matthews.

"To be slotted in there is a challenge for me and I'll try to answer the bell," Brown said. "Mitch will be back here soon, but obviously it's a bit of a setback, a little adversity for us, something to overcome."

* The Leafs have lost seven of 10 games. Babcock was asked if in today's NHL, where parity seems to reign supreme, it's hard to build much momentum. "It's tough to get on a roll probably any time, but you still need to get on one so it's time for us to get on a roll," he said. The task won't be easy on Saturday with the Ottawa Senators paying a visit to the Air Canada Centre. "They're a team, a lot like us, in that the neutral zone's hard to get through so you're going to have make good plays and score off the cycle," Babcock said. "I liked Ottawa's game last night. I thought they played good." The Senators have won three of four games including a 3-0 victory over the Devils on Thursday. 

* Josh Leivo took Marner's spot on the top power play unit at Friday's practice. "He was our best forward last game by far," Babcock said. "He was in on all the offence." Leivo, who has five points and 10 shots in the last two games, practised on a line with Nazem Kadri and Leo Komarov. "He's got to get quicker," Babcock said of Leivo. "He's worked on it. Being scratched as much as he was he had lots of time to do some skating, got himself in shape, probably the best shape he's ever been in and it looks like it when he plays."

* Frederik Andersen is expected to make his 47th start of the season on Saturday night. Will Babcock manage his minutes down the stretch to ensure he's fresh for the playoffs? "Oh, I'm not thinking about that one bit. You get into the playoffs, you're ready for the playoffs, it's that simple," he said with a shrug. "Maybe when I was winning 58 games a year in Detroit I could worry about that, but that's not the real world. You try to get in and then whatever happens (happens). The amazing thing about the playoffs is there's a jolt of energy that happens to you right away and it's not a big issue for you. Let's just win tomorrow's game." Andersen has never started more than 53 games in an NHL regular season. If he plays in every game other than the second game of a back-to-back situation then he will finish with 67 starts. 

* Lines at Friday's practice:

Hyman-Matthews-Nylander
van Riemsdyk-Bozak-Brown 
Komarov-Kadri-Leivo 
Martin-Smith-Soshnikov

Rielly-Zaitsev 
Gardiner-Carrick 
Hunwick-Polak
Marincin-Marchenko 

Andersen 
McElhinney

* Power play units at Friday's practice: 

Gardiner
Matthews-Brown-Nylander 
Martin^

Zaitsev 
Bozak-Kadri-Leivo
JVR 

^ Placeholder for Komarov