Post-Game Talk: Leafs Best Senators in OT

[SensHulk]

Tkachuk has been falling over A LOT lately, not sure what’s going on there. For a power forward, I expected him to drive to the net more while protecting the puck. There was an opportunity late in the 3rd where he just fired off a weak back hander that Campbell stopped easily, was thinking why he didn’t just try to cut towards the front more and get a better shot off. Hoping it’s some injury but if not, yeesh weak sauce man

 

[SensFactor]

Tkachuk has been falling over A LOT lately, not sure what’s going on there. For a power forward, I expected him to drive to the net more while protecting the puck. There was an opportunity late in the 3rd where he just fired off a weak back hander that Campbell stopped easily, was thinking why he didn’t just try to cut towards the front more and get a better shot off. Hoping it’s some injury but if not, yeesh weak sauce man

He's 21 still lets not forget. He's going to make mistakes just like the rest of the young forwards we have. However, I agree his skating and balance needs work. He would benefit from Gary Roberts power skating camp in the summer.

Elite Athlete In-Season | GR Performance

 

[Ice-Tray]

I liked the fourth line, Bishop has been a nice surprise as has Dzingle. and Formenton was faaaast and great defensively. Our roster is slowly starting to flesh out with the kids.

Forsberg was awesome! It’s funny watching the three last guys play. They are all different. This guy was very aggressive out of the net, but quelled the fears that were so often associated with Andy leaving the net. It makes such a difference having tat third D kind of goalie back there. He was spot on all night,

First goal was a massive late deflection, second goal was a pinball, and the third was a cluster truck, where he was a little slow getting back after committing to the Matthews flub.

All of a sudden we look to have a bunch of interesting players in net!

Matthews looks like trash right now, guys confidence looks shot, Hyman looks good.

Brady was off tonight, and I thought Daddy looked dangerous, but is lacking the right line mates at the moment to make him more of a scoring threat.

I think our D was pretty good on the whole tonight, TO didn’t really do a whole lot, and Forsberg was there when they did. Definitely didn’t make it look like a first against last match up.

Onwards and upwards

 

[coladin]

Good had a night to sleep on saying anything.

Back to back games, 3 out of 4 points. Forsberg played great, especially in the first 10 minutes where it could have been 3-0.

I think defensively, this team is playing much better, and the reality is Murray behind this style of play may have the same results as the other goalies.

Chabot was not good. Too many unforced errors, and the reality is that OT play is no different than the Spezza and no different than the bonehead plays he makes in the first, when my kid is already saying he plays too much. Fact of the matter is people around here get mad at scrubs who make league minimum for playing...like they make league minimum. They lose their shit at Reilly who plays better than any player should at 1.5M. But Chabot gets all the benefits of the doubt. He is not an 8M player and will not be an 8M player until two things happen:

1. A top 4 to help him out, pushing other players into more appropriate roles

2. Accountability - he needs to learn from his mistakes. He clearly doesn't because Boucher, Crawford and DJ all kiss his ass.

Timmy and Drake were bad again. This is where maybe decent vets can push these guys down, get better matchups because they are forcing pucks all over the place. This stretch is really showing that Josh Norris clearly should get more votes for the Calder.

And why the f*** is Zub not out there in OT? Why was Formnenton saved to the very end? Some terrbile coaching decisions by DJ who is out coaching himself

 

[Ice-Tray]

I think they should probably break up bath and jimmy for a bit, and Brady needs a change too I think.

Guys just might be tired.

As for Chabot, I think he’ll stabilize as our D does. He also won’t have to be the prime defender once Sanderson arrives. He’ll be able to be the guy who pushes offence more, while Sanderson does the heavy lifting against the top centres.

I don’t see a reason to panic, and I don’t think that playing a lot is breaking down Chabot. He has always made boneheaded moves when he’s trying to do too much, it’s not that he’s tired, he’s just rolling solo as the top offensive and defensive dman, but that will change soon.

 

[SensHulk]

There’s something about a game being the 3rd in 4 nights that always catches up. Sens had no business being in that game, but agreed with a lot of takes on us playing Chabot too much. He didn’t have a good game IMO but I’m willing to acknowledge he’s our best d-man and needs more support.

And holy hell, can we talk about how BAD our power play is? Holy smokes their entries are pathetic

 

[SensFactor]

Batherson has fallen off the radar recently. He a hard time winning puck battles yesterday. I think we should split his line up. I would put Dzingel with Batherson.

 

[BankStreetParade]

Using that logic, Chabot should be able to run 5 marathons in one day because he's had months and months of inactivity. That's not how the body works with athletic workload. You have to factor in wear and tear over a compressed schedule. In order to maintain healthy tissue and optimum CNS load, the body needs adequate rest. Overloading a player is how you create lingering injuries like groin pulls etc. Most of the supporting musculature that braces your joints are comprised of smaller muscles that can only do so much work before failing. If a supporting muscle fails, that's how you get some serious issues with torn labrums etc.

You think 26:32 per game of TOI is like running 5 marathons in a single day? What a terrible analogy. He hasn't played any more games so far this year than any of the other big minute guys like Doughty, Burns, Nurse and Hedman. And he's not going to be playing 82 games this year, so the original point I made stands.

He played 26 minutes per game last season over 71 games. To think he can't do the same in about 70% of a season is just absurd.

 

[BondraTime]

You think 26:32 per game of TOI is like running 5 marathons in a single day? What a terrible analogy. He hasn't played any more games so far this year than any of the other big minute guys like Doughty, Burns, Nurse and Hedman. And he's not going to be playing 82 games this year, so the original point I made stands.

He played 26 minutes per game last season over 71 games. To think he can't do the same in about 70% of a season is just absurd.

It's more so the past 5 games that have been absurd, where he's played 157 minutes, 31.5 per game. The next closest guy on the team is Zaitsev at 115 minutes, 23 per game.

The rest of the season Chabot has been in the 24-27 range, which is exactly where he should be.

 

[Adrianopolous]

Someone has to tell Stutzle that those cute dangles and forced passes to Bath will not work against NHL defenders. How many times has he tried passing the puck through 5 sets of legs, or tried to dangle through a defender? That stuff doesn't work in the NHL.

 

[BankStreetParade]

It's more so the past 5 games that have been absurd, where he's played 157 minutes, 31.5 per game. The next closest guy on the team is Zaitsev at 115 minutes, 23 per game.

The rest of the season Chabot has been in the 24-27 range, which is exactly where he should be.

His biggest minute games in that stretch have all come in games that went to OT where he plays the majority of that 5 minutes because the rest of the D are average skaters who don't contribute a huge amount offensively.

 

[BondraTime]

His biggest minute games in that stretch have all come in games that went to OT where he plays the majority of that 5 minutes because the rest of the D are average skaters who don't contribute a huge amount offensively.

Take out his 8 minutes of OT time in that frame and he's at 30 minutes a game, and still has a game with no OT over 30 minutes.

His 5 highest minute games have all come in the past 6 games, 5 of which he was at 30 minutes.

 

[slamigo]

Someone has to tell Stutzle that those cute dangles and forced passes to Bath will not work against NHL defenders. How many times has he tried passing the puck through 5 sets of legs, or tried to dangle through a defender? That stuff doesn't work in the NHL.

That's the only reason I watch the games though.

 

[FormentonTheFuture]

Someone has to tell Stutzle that those cute dangles and forced passes to Bath will not work against NHL defenders. How many times has he tried passing the puck through 5 sets of legs, or tried to dangle through a defender? That stuff doesn't work in the NHL.

Agreed but that's why he's playing here, to work out the kinks and learn how to play in the NHL.

 

[OD99]

Tkachuk has been falling over A LOT lately, not sure what’s going on there. For a power forward, I expected him to drive to the net more while protecting the puck. There was an opportunity late in the 3rd where he just fired off a weak back hander that Campbell stopped easily, was thinking why he didn’t just try to cut towards the front more and get a better shot off. Hoping it’s some injury but if not, yeesh weak sauce man

In general his game has taken in dip the last couple of weeks but that play in particular I think he was at the end of a shift and just wanted to get the puck on net and get off.

 

[supsens]

Tkachuk has been falling over A LOT lately, not sure what’s going on there. For a power forward, I expected him to drive to the net more while protecting the puck. There was an opportunity late in the 3rd where he just fired off a weak back hander that Campbell stopped easily, was thinking why he didn’t just try to cut towards the front more and get a better shot off. Hoping it’s some injury but if not, yeesh weak sauce man

He plays too hard and its wearing him out. He was looking like he was having problems picking himself up off the ice.

 

[Jorge Garcia]

Someone has to tell Stutzle that those cute dangles and forced passes to Bath will not work against NHL defenders. How many times has he tried passing the puck through 5 sets of legs, or tried to dangle through a defender? That stuff doesn't work in the NHL.

Sometimes it does. But you can't try it so much that it's predictable, which it is now.

 

[ReginKarlssonLehner]

Someone has to tell Stutzle that those cute dangles and forced passes to Bath will not work against NHL defenders. How many times has he tried passing the puck through 5 sets of legs, or tried to dangle through a defender? That stuff doesn't work in the NHL.

You're right, good ol' hockey players know the best pass is off a dump and chase hustle or off a 50 floater from the point.

 

[JD1]

Good had a night to sleep on saying anything.

Back to back games, 3 out of 4 points. Forsberg played great, especially in the first 10 minutes where it could have been 3-0.

I think defensively, this team is playing much better, and the reality is Murray behind this style of play may have the same results as the other goalies.

Chabot was not good. Too many unforced errors, and the reality is that OT play is no different than the Spezza and no different than the bonehead plays he makes in the first, when my kid is already saying he plays too much. Fact of the matter is people around here get mad at scrubs who make league minimum for playing...like they make league minimum. They lose their shit at Reilly who plays better than any player should at 1.5M. But Chabot gets all the benefits of the doubt. He is not an 8M player and will not be an 8M player until two things happen:

1. A top 4 to help him out, pushing other players into more appropriate roles

2. Accountability - he needs to learn from his mistakes. He clearly doesn't because Boucher, Crawford and DJ all kiss his ass.

Timmy and Drake were bad again. This is where maybe decent vets can push these guys down, get better matchups because they are forcing pucks all over the place. This stretch is really showing that Josh Norris clearly should get more votes for the Calder.

And why the f*** is Zub not out there in OT? Why was Formnenton saved to the very end? Some terrbile coaching decisions by DJ who is out coaching himself

A couple of great takes in here on Murray and Chabot

 

[JD1]

It's more so the past 5 games that have been absurd, where he's played 157 minutes, 31.5 per game. The next closest guy on the team is Zaitsev at 115 minutes, 23 per game.

The rest of the season Chabot has been in the 24-27 range, which is exactly where he should be.

Right. It is the last 5 games.

But guys are saying we need a top 4 to endure he doesn't have to play those minutes

With a 30-20-10 ice-time distribution, is it a top 4 we need? Or a bottom pair we need? It's the latter. It's the sub 10 minutes on the bottom pair LD that's causing the problem.

 

[Micklebot]

Right. It is the last 5 games.

But guys are saying we need a top 4 to endure he doesn't have to play those minutes

With a 30-20-10 ice-time distribution, is it a top 4 we need? Or a bottom pair we need? It's the latter. It's the sub 10 minutes on the bottom pair LD that's causing the problem.

I suppose that depends on whether you think the 2nd pair is playing the right amount of mins for them.

People want a top 4 to push a guy like Reilly or Zaitsev down to where they see a better fit. They don't likely see either player playing their current role on a contender.

The net effect when looking solely at mins for each pair is the same though, the third pair plays more mins to ease the pressure on the top pair,

 

[Sens of Anarchy]

I suppose that depends on whether you think the 2nd pair is playing the right amount of mins for them.

People want a top 4 to push a guy like Reilly or Zaitsev down to where they see a better fit. They don't likely see either player playing their current role on a contender.

The net effect when looking solely at mins for each pair is the same though, the third pair plays more mins to ease the pressure on the top pair,

Not ideal.. not many teams would have those 2 in their top 4. That's where we have a gap in our D.. makes it hard to break guys in on the bottom pair with poor insulation from their partner, and then trust them enough to take minutes away. We end up playing players who would be ideally slotted lower too many minutes and we and up overplaying Chabot.. Will Brannstrom be able to sustain the trust when he comes back in.. have to see. Will JBD when he comes in? Will the criteria change after the TDL? That's why so many people have been clamoring to quality reinforcements to the D corps. Having a quality partner would be night and day for breaking players in.