Igor Shesterkin Out for the Season: What It Means for the Leafs

The Igor Shesterkin injury: what happened

The New York Rangers announced on Saturday, Oct. 10, that goaltender Igor Shesterkin will miss the rest of the 2026-27 season with a lower-body injury. The Igor Shesterkin injury happened at 8:20 of the second period of a 3-1 loss to the Washington Capitals on Friday, Oct. 9, when his right skate jammed into the goalpost as he scrambled back to his crease and his leg bent under him. Defencemen Sean Durzi and Marcus Pettersson helped him off the ice; he could not put weight on his right leg, according to NHL.com.

The Rangers have not publicly named the injury. ESPN reported it as a right-knee injury, and head coach Mike Sullivan declined to say whether it was a torn ligament. The timeline says enough: the best-paid goalie in NHL history is done for the year five starts in.

This is not a Maple Leafs story on its face. It becomes one quickly, because of what New York now needs and where it might go to find it.

Shesterkin's season, and the Rangers' crease now

Shesterkin was off to a strong start. Here is what he leaves behind and who is left to replace him, per NHL.com:

GoalieStatus2026-27 to dateNoteIgor ShesterkinOut for season3-1-0, 1.79 GAA, .927$11.5M cap hit through 2032-33Joonas KorpisaloOut four more weeks—Lower-body injuryDylan GarandStarter for nowCareer: 3-1-1, 1.31 GAA, .95424, five NHL games, one shutout

Garand, who cleared waivers in late September and was recalled from AHL Hartford on Oct. 1, has been excellent in a tiny sample, including a 22-save shutout at Detroit on Oct. 2. He was expected to start Sunday against the Vancouver Canucks. "Our message is, we keep fighting. It's a next-man-up mindset," Sullivan said, per NHL.com. That is what a coach has to say. It is not what a general manager has to believe.

Shesterkin is in the second season of an eight-year, $92-million contract signed in December 2024. Because he is out for the season, the Rangers can place him on long-term injured reserve and exceed the cap by up to his $11.5-million cap hit while he is out. ESPN's Emily Kaplan reported Saturday that the Rangers are expected to explore their goaltending options.

It is worth being precise about what LTIR does and does not do, because Leafs fans know the mechanism well. Toronto is using it this season for Max Domi, Dakota Joshua and Elvis Merzlikins, per the LeafsLurker contracts page. LTIR is not cap space in the usual sense: it lets a team go over the ceiling by up to the injured player's cap hit, and that room disappears the moment the player is healthy. Because Shesterkin is not expected back this season, New York's room is real for 2026-27, but every dollar of it vanishes next summer when his $11.5 million returns to the books.

That is the key to reading the Rangers' options. A rental or a goalie with one season left fits perfectly. A long-term contract does not.

Why the Leafs should care: the Hellebuyck market

The obvious name is Connor Hellebuyck. Winnipeg's star is suspended after failing to report to training camp following his trade request, and the Jets have not found a deal they like. We noted this week that Winnipeg's strong start told the Jets they could wait. A big-market buyer with LTIR room changes that calculus.

No report has linked the Rangers to Hellebuyck directly, and the obstacles are real. He carries an $8.5-million cap hit through 2030-31, he controls his destination through his no-trade protection, and he has been reported to want a team he believes can win soon. New York also has Shesterkin's full cap hit coming back next season, so adding Hellebuyck long-term would mean paying two goalies a combined $20 million in 2027-28.

But here is the Toronto angle. The team most often linked to Hellebuyck has been the Buffalo Sabres, with Sportsnet's Nick Kypreos also naming San Jose and Utah as teams monitoring the situation. Buffalo is in the Atlantic Division. Every scenario that sends Hellebuyck somewhere other than Buffalo, Montreal or another Atlantic rival is good news for the Leafs, and a Metropolitan Division buyer with cap room and a sudden hole in net is exactly that scenario. We laid out the stakes in our piece on what a Hellebuyck trade to an Atlantic rival would mean for Toronto's playoff math.

The Montreal wrinkle

Some analysts have floated Montreal's Samuel Montembeault as a shorter-term target for the Rangers. That is speculation, not reporting. But it is worth following from Toronto, because the Canadiens moving a goalie would tell you how Montreal's front office sees its own season.

Montreal has already made one depth move this month, sending defenceman Jayden Struble to Nashville for a 2027 second-round pick. A team that sells a goalie in October is either confident in its depth or recalibrating its expectations, and either answer matters to a Leafs team that will be fighting Montreal for an Atlantic playoff spot. Watch the standings on this one.

The lesson for Toronto's crease

Every team believes its goaltending depth is fine until a Friday night in Washington. The Rangers had a Vezina winner, a veteran backup and a 24-year-old who had cleared waivers two weeks earlier. One injury to the backup and one awkward slide into the post, and the 24-year-old is the starter for the foreseeable future.

Toronto's crease is built differently, but it is not risk-free. Sergei Bobrovsky is 38. Anthony Stolarz is 32 and has missed time with injuries before. Behind them is Artur Akhtyamov, a 2026 AHL all-star who is the Marlies' starter and the organization's No. 3, with Ken Appleby and Samuel Hlavaj also on the AHL roster. That is a reasonable depth chart. It is also one injury away from leaning on a goalie with very little NHL experience.

LeafsLurker's position: if a goalie-needy team calls about Stolarz this season, John Chayka should not take the call seriously. Stolarz is signed at $3.75 million through 2029-30 with a modified no-trade clause, which is fair value for a 1B goalie in a $104-million cap world, and the case for him is about insurance as much as starts. We made a version of this argument in the summer, when we wrote that Toronto should trade Stolarz only for a real starter. Shesterkin's injury is the strongest case yet for keeping two NHL goalies on the roster and not getting cute with either of them.

What's next

The Rangers' next move could come quickly: with Korpisalo out for another month, they are leaning on a goalie with five NHL games behind him, and whoever backs him up will come from the AHL or the waiver wire. A short-term veteran, a waiver claim or a modest trade is far more likely than a blockbuster in October. If New York does go big for Hellebuyck, expect it to take weeks, not days, because of his clause and Winnipeg's asking price.

For the Leafs, the to-do list is simple: watch where Hellebuyck lands, watch whether Montreal sells, and keep Bobrovsky and Stolarz healthy. Toronto's own goalie plan, including how Hiller splits the starts, matters more today than it did on Friday.