Summarize and humanize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in EnglishThe Maple Leafs will play with only five defencemen when they host the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday.An injury to Oliver Ekman-Larsson, on top of a lingering injury to Jake McCabe and a salary-cap crunch, means the Leafs have no choice but to play a defenceman short for one game against a divisional rival.The team will be free to recall a defenceman from the Toronto Marlies — one who makes $850,000 or less — to play Sunday’s game in Carolina if Ekman-Larsson and McCabe are still unavailable, which seems like a legitimate possibility.“It’s always challenging,” Leafs coach Craig Berube said of playing with five defenders following Friday’s practice. “But we’ve played games where we lost a D early in the game and we played with five. It’s important that our forwards do a good job of helping our D out (Saturday) night, making sure they get back quick for breakouts and things like that. Make the game easy on them as much as possible.”Limiting extended shifts in the defensive zone, Berube added, would be paramount.With Ekman-Larsson and McCabe both out, Simon Benoit will join Chris Tanev on the Leafs’ shutdown pair against the Habs — though with five defencemen it’s a sure thing that the defence pairings will be scrambled all night.The NHL’s salary cap can be particularly hard to navigate late in a season, after teams have added players at the trade deadline. It’s not uncommon for teams that run into injuries having to play a player short, after which point they can use a cap-free emergency recall of a low-salaried minor league player.The Oilers had to play with five defencemen in a game earlier this week due to the same rules, which prevent teams from placing players on long term injured reserve if there are fewer than 10 games remaining in their season.In addition to Ekman-Larsson and McCabe, David Kämpf also remains out with an injury.The Leafs also lack enough cap space to take either Jani Hakanpää or Max Pacioretty off injured reserve, assuming they would be able to play.These issues won’t hurt the Leafs in the playoffs as the NHL cap isn’t in effect in the postseason. But Saturday’s game against red-hot Montreal still matters for their division chase and having only five defencemen obviously isn’t ideal.This isn’t the first time the Leafs have run into these late season issues. Two years ago they played several games without a backup under NHL contract in order to stay cap compliant.The Leafs have just $195,000 in cap space available at the moment.Ekman-Larsson crashed hard into the boards in overtime during the Leafs’ win in Tampa on Wednesday night. The 33-year-old didn’t practise on Friday and neither did McCabe, who has missed the last three games with an undisclosed issue.Berube said that McCabe is expected to return before the end of the regular season – though only two games will remain after this weekend. McCabe, at the very least, is expected to be ready to play in Game 1 of the postseason.Currently with the Marlies, Dakota Mermis ($775,000 cap hit) played in one game for the Utah Hockey Club this season and could be an option. Marshall Rifai ($775,000), who suited up in two games for the Leafs last season, would be another.Matt Benning, a long-time NHL defenceman, wouldn’t qualify though. He owns a cap hit of $1.25 million that exceeds the emergency recall rules.(Photo by Chris Tanouye/Getty Images)
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