Post-Game Talk: Leafs Beat Zebras 4-3

[Warden of the North]

Easy game? Does he not look at the standings?

Probably not. A lot of these guys dont until crunch time, if at all.

 

[Pookie]

I had this argument plenty during the 2013/2014 season.

Right. This whole "underlying numbers" predicted a decline nonsense.

I've tackled this many times myself. With r2 and correlations and challenges. Let me simply say that if these underlying numbers were so predictive, sports gambling houses would be broke.

They clearly aren't.

If you play continually badly and win, odds are you will eventually play bad and lose.

And if you continually play good and win odds are you will eventually lose.

All winning streaks come to an end.

See "independent events"

 

[Mugzy97]

If I didn't know the score and just read the comments here, I would conclude we lost badly and we're 2-8 in our last ten.

Seriously tho eh? People want to fix what’s not broke.

 

[DarkKnight]

I know it's still early, but we are opening up some serious room in our division, 9 full points clear of fourth, and guaranteed playoffs, with a game in hand. Not bad for a bunch of slugs and their shit coach.

 

[Nithoniniel]

This was a rough game for us, I think, and one where I'm going to point the finger a lot on Babcock. Three of four lines doesn't work well right now, and two of them got completely mashed in and couldn't find each other if their life depended on it, and they got repeatedly thrown out there to get beaten up. It's not that he threw tons of ice time on particular players, it's that he chose to give them to guys that were completely under the ice tonight. I'm a huge fan of Babcock, but he can certainly be rigid and tonight it's hard to argue that it wasn't to the detriment of the team.

If we continue playing these lines and show no inclination to adapting in our breakout systems, we'll continue to perform like this, and it'll come back to haunt us.

Great
Bozak - This line had a terrific night in all regards. They were dangerous more or less every shift, and was flying out there. Shame they barely got used.
Marner - Mitchy was absolutely buzzing tonight, barely saw him out there not flying around getting to pucks, attacking the opposition, and tearing down their structure.

Good
JVR - The least good on a terrific line. They talked about how JVR is nursing an injury, anybody know anything about that?

Average
Brown - His line was absolutely dysfunctional, but Brown looked good on the PK and had a few high-end plays on the other end for us.
Rielly - Offensively dynamic, defensively questionable.
Polak - Got sheltered all to hell, but hard to complain about how he managed it.
Andersen - Andersen was fine tonight.

Bad
Marleau - Showed some life and initiative at times, and didn't just turtle in front of the onslaught.
Moore - Got thrown up the lineup for some reason and got absolutely toyed with.
Martin - We might as well have played without him tonight. I don't see the point in playing someone 5 minutes where they do nothing. Get a PKer in there at least.
Gardiner - Did the best he could, but his matchups got caved in.
Zaitsev - Same as Gardiner. Had nothing against them individually, but neither provided some spark that could alleviate all that pressure.
Hainsey - Pretty much the same as the other pairing.
Borgman - Super sheltered minutes, did OK in them but had a few too many mistakes for my taste.

Awful
Matthews - Auston got schooled tonight.
Hyman - Hyman did nothing right, but had over 20 minutes of ice time and looked like he could barely move towards the end. Jeez, Babs.
Kadri - Naz got schooled tonight.
Komarov - The biggest issue on that line. Komarov couldn't handle the puck, couldn't contain his guys, got outskated, outskilled, outworked (!).
Nylander - Barely moved.

 

[showtime8]

Love to see the initial push and take the game to the Pens early on. Jarry didn't look comfortable in the net at all.

It's easy to see why Nylander didn't get any ice-time. He hasn't competed well at all. Lax in the defensive zone and not pushing the play enough in the offensive zone.

 

[realgoodleafs]

Always the same two fools crying about winning.. Don't agree with Nylander playing only 58 seconds in the 3rd and 9 mins in the game but if you actually watch the game you would notice that Pittsburgh pretty much went down to 2 and a half lines.. If you noticed the Bozak lined played 12 to 13 mins and babs kept putting our better defensive lines in Leo-Kadri-Marleau and Hyman-Matthews-Brown.. and lets be real here.. all those guys are better then Willy in our own end.

Exactly. It had nothing to do with Nylander. Crosby and Malkin didn't get off the ice in the 3rd and the Marner line was buzzing so there wasn't much ice time left over.

 

[Nithoniniel]

Exactly. It had nothing to do with Nylander. Crosby and Malkin didn't get off the ice in the 3rd and the Marner line was buzzing so there wasn't much ice time left over.

Nylanders ice time tonight was all about Nylander. He barely moved once he got on the ice. He thoroughly deserved to be benched.

 

[DarkKnight]

Marner was fantastic and only got a measly 12 minutes of ice time, to me that is more noteworthy than disinterested Nylander...for this game at least.

 

[BertCorbeau]

Marner was fantastic and only got a measly 12 minutes of ice time, to me that is more noteworthy than disinterested Nylander...for this game at least.

Well it was a strange game. The Leafs got off to a big lead .. Naturally as the game played into the second half the Leafs sat back defensively. In the third the Pens were throwing out Crosby and Malkin nearly every other shift and Babcock wanted to keep sheltering that Bozak line while not putting his fourth line out there against those big guns. That is one reason why the TOI is low.

Another reason is that the Leafs only had 1 PP all game. Another 2-3 PP opportunities and Marner is closer to 15-16 minutes and Nylander is around 11-12.

 

[deletethis]

Nylander played poorly? There's almost a hive mind at times. The Emperor Has No Clothes: Nylander carried his line every time he was on the ice. He's the main reason that line can generate offensive zone time.

 

[realgoodleafs]

Nylanders ice time tonight was all about Nylander. He barely moved once he got on the ice. He thoroughly deserved to be benched.

Well he definitely didn't earn a promotion but there was no ice time for the 4th line tonight no matter what happened.

 

[Nithoniniel]

Nylander played poorly? There's almost a hive mind at times. The Emperor Has No Clothes: Nylander carried his line every time he was on the ice. He's the main reason that line can generate offensive zone time.

Nylander barely touched the puck tonight. He barely had any completed passes, and had the puck with control in the offensive zone once.

I'm the furthest thing from a Nylander critic, but I see absolutely no way to arrive at the conclusion that you did after this game.

 

[Liminality]

Always the same two fools crying about winning.. Don't agree with Nylander playing only 58 seconds in the 3rd and 9 mins in the game but if you actually watch the game you would notice that Pittsburgh pretty much went down to 2 and a half lines.. If you noticed the Bozak lined played 12 to 13 mins and babs kept putting our better defensive lines in Leo-Kadri-Marleau and Hyman-Matthews-Brown.. and lets be real here.. all those guys are better then Willy in our own end.

People never really take the numbers and put them into context. Pens went to 2 lines and Babcock is a matchup coach, what do people think is going to happen. Pens top 6 is still the best in the league or one of the best in the league.

 

[lifelonghockeyfan]

Last night Jake Gardiner actually knocked a player off his feet. A beautiful shoulder leverage play put Kessel on his ass.
I don't think I have ever seen Jake knock a player down before in his NHL career.

Kudos for Gardiner. Kudos for Kessel, for smiling later.

 

[pylon17]

Leo was a solider tonight PK beast.

 

[Mess]

Bozak - JVR - Marner looked great tonight. It was nice to see them clicking

Andersen was solid for us.

This is where Leafs depth and Babcock's line strategy worked as he planned it.

He has Matthews and Kadri his 2 top lines go head to head against Crosby and Malkin all night, with containing and limiting them and hopefully offsetting their offense.

What this strategy does however is utilize Leafs depth and Leafs 3rd line the Bozak trio gets to play against the oppositions 3rd and 4th lines and because of the lines talent should on most nights have a huge advantage in QofC and exploit that.. Yesterday the trio combined for 7 points and the reason the Leafs won the game, but for the previous 7 games they were held pointless at ES 5v5 and forced Andersen to be the star to save the Leafs.

 

[Nithoniniel]

He has Matthews and Kadri his 2 top lines go head to head against Crosby and Malkin all night, with containing and limiting them and hopefully offsetting their offense.

The Crosby and Malkin lines spent every shift in our zone and created tons of chances, and went of ice with several goals. Nothing here can be said to have gone according to plan.

If our strategy consists of hanging on for dear life, and hope that our third line has an unusually inspired performance to create a bunch of goals, then that's a losing strategy for a bad team.

 

[saltming]

Heres the thing; people are being willfully ignorant of our good games, or at the very least the good parts of the games we do win. Tonight was at best from the Pens perspective EVEN through two periods, and from our perspective good if not great. If not for some ridiculous reffing we'd of had this game well in hand. We were bad for like 5 minutes vs the Canucks a week ago. We DOMINATED the Oilers last week for a period, played them to a draw for 30 of the next 40 minutes. Did we play Calgary poorly? Yes. But good teams find ways to win when they dont have it.

I also for the life of me can't figure out why people hold having a good goalie against teams. No team is good enough to win a Championship with poor goaltending. Your goalie MUST steal periods, if not whole games from time to time.

Also we spanked Calgary in their barn not to long before they came here. The flames were out for blood when they got here.
Beating a team twice is such a short time span is not easy especially when you embarrassed them at home just before.

 

[saltming]

The Crosby and Malkin lines spent every shift in our zone and created tons of chances, and went of ice with several goals. Nothing here can be said to have gone according to plan.

If our strategy consists of hanging on for dear life, and hope that our third line has an unusually inspired performance to create a bunch of goals, then that's a losing strategy for a bad team.

I thought the Malkin goal was a ppg and the Crosby one was an obvious breakdown from Brown?
Doesn't sound so bad really. 1 ppg and 1 even steength. I don't like playing in our own end but that was really only the last 20 minutes of the game. The first 40 were pretty even imo

 

[Warden of the North]

Also we spanked Calgary in their barn not to long before they came here. The flames were out for blood when they got here.
Beating a team twice is such a short time span is not easy especially when you embarrassed them at home just before.

No kidding, but that doesnt fit this boards narrative that we dont deserve any of our wins.

I sometimes think people here need to watch other teams. No team plays perfect every game.

 

[LastOne2100]

It is a very very rare occurrence that we dominate teams, but we seem to get outplayed fairly frequently for large stretches.

I really think Babcock needs to stop juggling our lines, put good players together, and let them build chemistry playing together. Look what happens when he puts JVR, Marner, and Bozak back together without constant fear of someone being demoted - they started to click together again and it shows.

It's getting comical at this point. Constantly punishing our young stars for not carrying the team is embarrassing. Put them with players that they've had proven success with, let them build confidence. If they have a bad game or two, it happens for all players - it's up to coaching staff to iron those out in practices and DEVELOP our young talent, not to simply send players to the doghouse.

If Andersen wasn't playing out of his mind, our record would not look anywhere close to where it is right now. But hey, that's why you pay a goaltender. But our record shouldn't automatically mean everything the team and the coach does it right and should be free from criticism.

 

[saltming]

No kidding, but that doesnt fit this boards narrative that we dont deserve any of our wins.

I sometimes think people here need to watch other teams. No team plays perfect every game.

Agreed!
I understood when we sucked and we were hating on management and all the bad decisions they made or if we're were a last place team, but we are not! We are at the top looking down.
I get that many people haven't played hockey but if you've watched enough hockey, and by hockey I mean hockey nor just leafs, you see that good teams just win. Lots of times they are the best team on the ice and sometimes "you have to be good to be lucky"

 

[LastOne2100]

I get that many people haven't played hockey but if you've watched enough hockey, and by hockey I mean hockey nor just leafs, you see that good teams just win. Lots of times they are the best team on the ice and sometimes "you have to be good to be lucky"

I'm not sure this is the right mentality to build a serious cup contender around - has Ottawa from last year or Colorado from a few years back written all over it. Tampa Bay looks pretty dominant in most contests they play - it's not just put luck or goal-tending stealing games, and I don't believe the Leafs are in the same tier.

If you want a cup in Toronto, you shouldn't be simply satisfied with where we are, you should always want us to be the best.

 

[Nithoniniel]

I thought the Malkin goal was a ppg and the Crosby one was an obvious breakdown from Brown?
Doesn't sound so bad really. 1 ppg and 1 even steength. I don't like playing in our own end but that was really only the last 20 minutes of the game. The first 40 were pretty even imo

Perhaps. I just checked the stats, and our top two lines were around 20-30% possession. That's absolutely horrendous, and I'm not sure that's just due to trying to keep the lead in the third.