Jake Gardiner will make his season debut Wednesday for the Toronto Maple Leafs, as the defenceman was activated to the 23-man roster. To make room for Gardiner, Korbinian Holzer has been assigned to the Toronto Marlies of the American Hockey League.

Confirmed!! Gardner plays tonight Korbinian Holzer sent down to #marlies.

— David Alter (@DavidAlter590) January 23, 2013

Gardiner has been on the sidelines with a concussion he suffered while playing with the Marlies during the NHL lockout.

James Reimer will likely get the start in net for the Maple Leafs, who look to get back on track as the team heads to Pittsburgh to play the Penguins on Wednesday.

James Reimer occupying visitors net. Likely starter tonight.

— David Alter (@DavidAlter590) January 23, 2013

Ben Scrivens started in the Leafs’ first two games this season, opening with a 2-1 win at Montreal on Saturday before falling 2-1 to Buffalo in Toronto’s first home game Monday.

The Leafs finished with one power-play goal in seven attempts and were 0 for 2 with a two-man advantage against the Sabres.

“I didn’t think there was any lack of effort with our group,” coach Randy Carlyle said. “I thought we were out of sorts in the first period and it showed in the execution of our power play.”

After struggling with the man advantage, Carlyle promised the Leafs would spend time working on the power play in practice on Tuesday, and that’s exactly what they did.

After yesterday’s failed 5-on-3 they are working on it big time at practice today, Kadri seeing pp time with Lupul and Kessel.

— David Alter (@DavidAlter590) January 22, 2013

Carlyle also mixed up a couple of Toronto’s lines during Tuesday’s practice.

Projected Lines MacArthur-Bozak-Kessel, JVR-Grabo-Kulemin, Lupul-Kadri-Komarov, Brown-McClement-Orr

— David Alter (@DavidAlter590) January 23, 2013

Pittsburgh is looking for its first 3-0-0 start since the 1994-95 season, when the Penguins won 12 of their first 13 games.

Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin have yet to score this season. The way the superstar duo’s teammates are playing for the Penguins at the moment, however, it hardly matters.

Not with forward James Neal picking up right where he left off during his career season a year ago. Not with No. 2 goaltender Tomas Vokoun looking very much like the reliable backup Pittsburgh envisioned when it traded for him last spring.

#Leafs vs. #Pens: Mike Kostka has 0-2-2 in 2 GP w/ significant PP time too. James Neal was held w/o a goal vs. TOR in four tries last year.

— Chris Nichols (@Nichols_NHLPool) January 23, 2013

Sure, it was just a 30-hour stretch in a season that even at 48 games will include some ups and downs. And while coach Dan Bylsma is quick to warn about the dangers of reading too much into emphatic road victories over Philadelphia and the New York Rangers, the fact is the Penguins appear to be very much as good as advertised heading into Wednesday night’s home opener against Toronto.

“To be able to get back-to-back wins (and be) four points up on the Rangers with that win, that’s two good road wins for our team,” Bylsma said.

Another great day for hockey in Pittsburgh. twitter.com/reporterchris/…

— Chris Johnston (@reporterchris) January 23, 2013

Though it’s still early, the Penguins are playing with a cohesion Bylsma wasn’t sure would surface so soon following an all-too-brief training camp. Given a week to get ready for the regular season, Bylsma didn’t have time to get a real feel for things, and instead focused on situational hockey like power play and penalty kill while hoping everything else would take care of itself.

Consider it done.

Even the new guys — the few that have stuck on one of the NHL’s most stable rosters — have found a way to fit in quickly.

Forward Tanner Glass dropped the gloves with Arron Asham following the opening faceoff in Sunday’s 6-3 win over New York. Glass acquitted himself quite nicely against one of the league’s tougher fighters and the jolt it sent through the Pittsburgh bench helped the Penguins take a quick lead on Neal’s first goal less than two minutes later.

“We wanted to get Tanner Glass for a reason,” Bylsma said. “He’s a physical guy. He can skate well for what he does but he’s also a grit and sandpaper guy for our lineup. The first two games, he had a number of physical plays. He had hits in the Philly game and then he steps up at the beginning of the game in New York and sets us up right off the hop.”

Third-line centre Brandon Sutter has looked exactly like the kind of steady two-way player the Penguins needed when they acquired him in a trade for popular Jordan Staal last May.

Even beleaguered defenceman Paul Martin is off to a quick start. The veteran was a focal point of the team’s defensive issues at the end of last season, but he keyed a handful of critical penalty kills in the third period against the Flyers and added a goal against the Rangers.

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Listen to Penguins GM Ray Shero gives his thoughts on Wendesday’s game.

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The special teams haven’t been too bad either. Pittsburgh converted 4 of 8 power plays over the weekend and killed eight of nine penalties. The only rough spot came in the third period against the Rangers, when things got a little loose after the Penguins took a 5-1 lead. New York drew within 5-3 before the Penguins settled down, the kind of hiccups Pittsburgh knows it needs to avoid.

Still, figuring out how to nurse a big lead over a rival on the road is a pretty good problem to have. So is wondering when Crosby and Malkin will find the back of the net. Not that they haven’t been busy. Malkin already has four assists in two games while Crosby collected his first helper Sunday.

Crosby has 17 goals in 22 career games against Toronto and Malkin has scored nine times in 20 matchups, but they may find it difficult to score with the Leafs being stingy so far this season.

These teams split four matchups last season, and Pittsburgh has won three straight and eight of 12 at home in the series.

With files from Associated Press