I’m going to keep this one short because it’s game #72 and there’s essentially nothing left to say about this team.
Erik Kallgren gets the nod tonight, which probably doesn’t matter. Kallgren played two fantastic games to start his year with the Leafs and, in the 5 games since, hasn’t posted better than a 0.885SV%. You can see the potential he carries, but at the moment he isn’t an NHL goalie.
The reason it doesn’t matter is that Jack Campbell hasn’t done much better. In the 4 games he has played (one in relief of Kallgren, who left with an injury against the Florida Panthers 4 nights ago) he had one stellar performance, one respectable performance and a pair of below average outings.
If the Leafs are going to win a round they’ll have to see improvement in the crease. In the meantime, the team needs to outscore their problems.
Which brings us to one of the problems.
It doesn’t appear that Justin Holl is among the 6 best defenders on the team at the moment, yet the coaching staff keeps trotting him out for 19+ minutes a night. He needs to sit, but instead it’s their better defensive options that are taking a back seat, specifically Ilya Lyubushkin and Timothy Liljegren.
Hopefully this gets ironed out before the playoffs begin, which is just a few short weeks away.
Enjoy the game.
GO LEAFS GO!!