After last nights win against the Utah Mammoth, the Leafs now sit in 3rd in the Atlantic Division and 5th in the Eastern Conference. They’re just 2pts behind the division and conference leading… Montreal Canadiens? Huh. Good for them.
It’s far too early in the season to watch the standings and that goes double in the east. It’s extremely cramped from top to bottom, as just 6pts separate the Canadiens from the conference trailing… Florida Panthers? Huh. Who’d of thunk it? Considering Matt Tkachuk and Alex Barkov (Barkov is out for the season) are on the sidelines, it’s no real surprise that Florida is struggling. However, I will admit that I expected more out of Sam Bennett (4pts, 13GP) and Sergei Bobrovsky (0.883SV%, 10GP) early in the season. I suspect they’ll figure it out and make the playoffs, but at the moment it’s nice to see the back-to-back Stanley Cup Champs struggling out of the gate.
Why, do you ask? Because when asked who would regress in the East the most it was unanimous that the Leafs, without Marner, were the team that took the biggest hit. It was known that Tkachuk would miss a chunk of the season and Barkov’s injury was also known to be very serious at the time, although maybe everyone didn’t know just how serious. I guess, in the long run, those players will return for Florida, while Marner will be gone permanently, but still, it seemed to be a biased opinion and now we’re seeing why. As it stands, even though the Leafs have looked uninspired out of the gate, they’re showing signs of life and settling into a future without an elite, playmaking winger to set up their Captain.
The Captain has 8 goals in 14 games as of this morning. That’s a 46 goal pace, so yes, he’d need to pick up the pace if he wants to hit the 60 goal plateau again, but no, that isn’t something to be disappointed about if 46 goals is where he ends up. The only real concern is that his overall point totals and effort level appears to be down. He’s under a point per game and that has to be a concern for somebody that is expected to be at, or above, 100pts by season’s end. What’s worse is that he doesn’t appear to be moving his feet as well and isn’t playing sound defensively. If your top centre is playing very well defensively, you simply aren’t as concerned about the point totals. If you don’t believe me you should consider the fact that Patrice Bergeron, who was considered a 1C and was coveted by every team in the NHL, only had a single PPG season in his career. Now, I’ll admit that Bergeron as an example is a special case because his defensive game was arguably among the best in the NHL all-time, but the point remains. When you play well on the defensive side of the puck you needn’t score at a 100pt pace to earn your paycheque. If you don’t want to use Bergeron as a reference, feel free to use Anze Kopitar as an example instead.
The Defense
When your top defensive defender goes down to injury, as Chris Tanev did this past Saturday, it throws a wrench into the gears and has an effect on the rest of your group. However, one pair that shouldn’t be affected is the Rielly/Carlo duo because they’ve been together since last season and yet they continue to look worse and worse each game. Carlo is pinching at the wrong times, which has left Rielly scrambling on 2-on-1’s at times. I was taught at a young age that you take away the pass and give the goalie the shooter in that scenario, but Rielly doesn’t play that way and I still don’t understand why. If he was elite at shutting down the play that way I’d get it, but a 2-on-1 against Rielly ends in a goal or fantastic save 99% of the time, like this one:
This isn’t to say that Carlo is the sole issue with that pairing. Rielly isn’t doing him any favours either, as he appears to be attempting to prove that he’s still a high end offensive threat. While doing so he has thrown caution to the wind on the defensive side of the puck, often jumping up into the play even when it’s not merited. In my opinion Carlo needs to settle into the defensive defender role even more, while Rielly needs to reign in the pond hockey antics and simply jump into the play at more opportune times.
Outside of that pair things aren’t all that bad. Ekman-Larsson continues to contribute on the scoresheet, while also bringing a 2-way game that is steady in all 3 zones. Jake McCabe is clearly the leader on the blueline right now and that was arguably the case even before Tanev went down to injury. Since the teams loss to Buffalo on Oct 24th, McCabe has 1 goal, 6pts, 1 fight, 11 blocks, 7 hits and 7 shots in 6 games played. The team has gone 5-1 during that stretch and have looked more like the team we wanted them to look like under Craig Berube. With that said…
Ready. Set. GO!!!
At some point this team needs to learn how to start on time. They’ve given up the first goal of the game in 7 straight contests now and the closest they’ve come to playing a full 60 minutes was last night against the Mammoth. While there are always momentum changes in a game, a consistent effort is underrated in their dressing room, but I’m wondering if that is beginning to change. Their game against Pittsburgh was a disgusting excuse in the effort department. They won via 4 goals in the 3rd period, but the talk afterward was about how poorly they played for 2/3rds of the game and rightfully so. A lot of TV’s turned off before the 3rd period began and while they didn’t give up, they shouldn’t be deemed tenacious either:
While Matthews addressed the room in a more positive manner than they deserved, the coaches and teammates in general concentrated on the first two periods of the game as something that is “unacceptable.” While we’ve heard this before, there was something a little different in the way they spoke this time around. Call me gullible, hopeful, whatever it is, I do hope they commit to change.
The Goalies
Anthony Stolarz hasn’t been enjoying the same success that he did last season. We’re seeing pucks go in the net that could and/or should be stopped. While he was right to call out his team a few weeks back for not doing enough to clear his crease, he needed to back that up with solid play afterwards and he hasn’t. The question now is why? He has played 11 of the first 14 games of the season, which means he’s 1/3rd of the way to his NHL high of 34 games played in a season. It also puts him almost 1/4th of the way to his 47 game professional high of 47 games played, which he set in the AHL during the 2015/16 season. Is this simply too much for him? Knowing that he had both knees iced during a post game interview already this season is less than encouraging and makes me think that he is simply being overused. While we all know that they have no other choice than to use him this much, it’s also disappointing to know how they got here. Yes, Joseph Woll unexpectedly left the team for personal reasons, but that shouldn’t have lead them to claim Cayden Primeau off of waivers. I’m not saying that they shouldn’t have taken somebody, instead I would have suggested literally anybody other than Primeau, who has failed to do anything more than warm the bench this season. I say that while knowing that he has 2 wins in 3 games played, but points matter in this league every night and it’s clear that the coaching staff are hesitant to give him anything more than the necessary start during a back-to-back set of games.
At this point I would hope that they’d feel more comfortable sending Primeau down to the minors, while giving Dennis Hildeby a shot at the backup position. At the very least I’d rather see Hildeby, who was drafted by and has been developed by the Leafs, get an NHL paycheque over Primeau.
With all of that said, the return of Woll is imminent, which means the backup position shouldn’t be a worry for long (shouldn’t). With a back-to-back set coming this weekend against the Boston Bruins and Carolina Hurricanes, I wonder if we’ll see Woll’s return in the coming days?
Nicholas Robertson
A section all his own in this rendition of Loose Leafs.
Robertson is a polarizing player to say the least. While he was held off the scoresheet against the Mammoth, he has 3 goals and 6pts over his past 6 games. I do love seeing that and I hope it continues, if nothing else he’s raising his trade value. However, while the old adage generally holds true that there is no such thing as a bad shot on net, it’s also true that keeping your head up and making a play can lead to wins. It’s these plays that will forever separate Robertson from the legitimate top 6 players in the NHL and a very clear example of it was witnessed last night:
With yet another attempt to score 5-hole, Robertson completely ignored the fact that he had Max Domi wide open and uncovered back door for a possible tap-in goal. I would have loved to see a pass there and my general sentiment is that I’d love to see a pass instead of a shot from him on at least one play a game. Hilariously it’s Domi that he fails to pass the puck to on this play. Domi is very often criticized for not shooting the puck enough, while Robertson should be criticized more for shooting even when he shouldn’t. If both players could borrow from one another just a little and adjust their mindsets, they’d become a far more dangerous duo.
The Revenge Game
Lastly, I’d like to end on a high note and acknowledge the fantastic game that Matias Maccelli had against his former team, the Utah Mammoth. We so often see a former player and/or a local player come into Toronto and score against the Leafs, it’s nice to be on the other side of that sometimes. After this pass to Auston Matthews, on which the Captain scored…
… it was great to see the Captain immediately acknowledge Maccelli. When he was acquired everybody knew it was for his playmaking ability, not his goal scoring, which makes that assist as a good as a goal for him. However, just to top it off he bent the twine anyway:
Maccelli hasn’t found instant chemistry within the Leafs’ lineup. Hopefully this is the beginning of a change on that front.