The Toronto Maple Leafs saw their season series against the Colorado Avalanche become perfectly balanced on Tuesday night, losing by the same score as they beat them by a month prior.
The Rundown
There was early reason to be excited in this one when Darren Raddysh finally scored his first goal as a Maple Leaf just three minutes into the first period, and it was in the most Raddysh way possible – an aboslute rocket from the point off a faceoff, top shelf past Mackenzie Blackwood. Colorado quickly regained composure and began to tilt the ice their way, and while the Leafs were able to fend off their pressure for a bit, the dam broke in the final minutes of the period. Brock Nelson found open space in a swift Avalanche counter-attack to tie the game, and a little over a minute later, Gabriel Landeskog capped off a cycle play to give Colorado the lead.
The Avalanche extended their lead to two early in the second period, when a chuck from the point beat a screened and surprised Sergei Bobrovsky. Toronto took a bit of time to push back, but even with a couple of penalties taken in between, started to generate some momentum as the period went on, and a penalty to Martin Necas gave them a chance to convert the momentum into something on their only powerplay of the game. While they didn’t take a shot on the man advantage, Easton Cowan went around the net, linked up with Gavin McKenna, took the puck back and squeaked one through Blackwood to get the Leafs back in the game.
For a brief moment, things were all tied up in the third, when Jack Roslovic blew by Brett Kulak, drove towards the paint, and slipped a backhand through Blackwood’s five-hole. Unfortunately, that level pegging lasted a whopping 49 seconds, as Landeskog was left wide open for a gimmie in the slot. It was a bad look for nearly everyone involved – Bobrovsky, Raddysh, Jake McCabe, and John Tavares all focused on a pass that none of them were able to get in the way of, and William Nylander slowly gliding into space instead of actually taking care of Landeskog. The Leafs made one last push in the final few minutes of regulation, but a bad line change gave Cale Makar an easy opportunity to find a streaking Artturi Lehkonen for an insurance tally with 2:45 remaining. Martin Necas capped the game off with an empty netter on the next shift.
Notes
- There’s a serious problem here with this second line. Ryan Tverberg didn’t exactly have a dazzling night, but given that he’s a call-up playing his first game of the year, we can excuse him. The bigger issue here is that XXX-Tavares-Nylander is a recipe for two-way disaster right now. They’re getting heavily out-shot and out-possessed basically every night they’re sent out there, and if they don’t generate goals to make up for it, it’s trouble.
- William Nylander in particular needs to hold himself to a higher standard than nights like last night. Was that the worst of his career? I can’t say for sure that it was, but it was a performance close enough to it to at least consider the possiblity, and that’s real troublesome. No shots on goal, just one low-percentage attempt, and some shocking defensive efforts on four goals against just isn’t acceptable.
- Another negative game relative to shot quality for Sergei Bobrovsky, who has allowed 3 or more goals in 12 of his first 13 apperances, and already lost ten games. Those looking to still justify the signing will say that the scoring chances he faced were difficult – there’s a certain point where you have to expect a player that they signed to a star contract despite his age to make difficult saves. We keep seeing late reactions and inability to battle through traffic and it’s not helping them. He’s not the sole reason they’re losing, but give us something.
- It was really nice to see Darren Raddysh finally get into the goal column. He’s probably not scoring 22 ever again, but he wasn’t going to stay goalless forever, so a bullet like that is a nice reward for his efforts to this point.
- I did not forsee Jack Roslovic becoming one of the most important members of this team to this stage. I don’t know whether this is praise for him or criticism for everyone else.
- Colorado’s second goal might’ve been the most frustrating of the night, if only because Nic Roy showed more skill in the 10 seconds leading up to Landeskog’s rebound than he did in his entire time in Toronto.
- Devon Toews and Sam Malinski were Colorado’s best players by Game Score tonight. I want to point this out amidst all the talk of the blue line, and how it’s difficult to find a top-end defenceman. A big part of Toronto’s mess on the blue line is a lack of willingness to open themselves up to taking chances on upside. They don’t leave themselves flexibility to pounce on trade opportunities, and when they do acquire players, it’s usually second or third-tier players whose upsides have already been realized. Colorado was able to scoop of Toews for a pair of second rounders and integrate him into their playstyle, and they found Malinski as a college free agent. Neither are huge and imposing, but both can make plays, get in lanes, and move pucks north. They found options on the upswing that fit their style of play, gave them opportunities, and got rewarded. When was the last time Toronto gave a serious attempt at replicating that?
- The “PK gets scored on every night” streak has finally been snapped at seven games. Going from “never get scored on again” to that was a bit of whiplash – maybe they’ll just be a normal team for a bit now?
- Nugget of positivity: Toronto is starting to show some fight in terms of controling the flow of play that they didn’t in the past couple of seasons. Natural Stat Trick has them winning the attempt and xG battles in 7 of their last 9 games. Part of that is probably score effects, but still better than geting their lunch fed to them every night like the Berube era.
Up Next
The Maple Leafs will look again to snap this losing streak on Thursday night, when they take on the Minnesota Wild. That’ll be a 7:00 PM puck drop – we’ll talk more about that tomorrow morning!
Numbers Game
| Top Performers | Bottom Performers | Top Opponents |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Easton Cowan (4.67) 1G, 1A, 4 SOG, +1, 72% xG | 1. William Nylander (-3.40) 0G, 0A, 0 SOG, -4, 20% xG | 1. Devon Toews (6.28) 1G, 1A, 2 SOG, +5, 63% xG |
| 2. Auston Matthews (4.65) 0G, 1A, 4 SOG, +1, 82% xG | 2. Ryan Tverberg (-2.93) 0G, 0A, 2 SOG, -2, 25% xG | 2. Sam Malinski (4.29) 0G, 1A, 2 SOG, +3, 63% xG |
| 3. Jack Roslovic (4.60) 1G, 1A, 5 SOG, +1, 78% xG | 3. John Tavares (-2.83) 0G, 0A, 1 SOG, -3, 18% xG | 3. Gabriel Landeskog (3.22) 2G, 0A, 4 SOG, 78% xG |
| Shots On Goal | 31-28 TOR | Faceoffs | 32 for 62 |
| 5v5 Shot Attempts | 61-50 TOR | Hits | 26-14 TOR |
| 5v5 Expected Goals | 2.66-2.13 TOR | Blocked Shots | 18-16 TOR |
| Best Period (xG) | 5v5: 2nd (74%) All: 1st (50%) | Powerplay | 0 for 1 (0 shots) |
| Worst Period (xG) | 5v5: 1st (50%) All: 3rd (36%) | Penalty Kill | 0 for 2 (3 shots) |
Table 1: Game Score via Dom, HockeyStatCards reccomended for full-game results
Table 2: Derived from NHL.com and Natural Stat Trick
Game Flow: via Natural Stat Trick
