The Toronto Maple Leafs are forcing Vancouver Canucks fans to wear the scariest Halloween costume of all to them – being fully dressed and ready for a 4:00 p.m. local game. I get why they don’t like their start times being dictated to them by the big evil city in the east, but getting a rivalry game out of the way and still having a night on the town on tap seems like a dream to me.
Either way, the Leafs badly need to end their road trip on a high note here, and in their way stands the worst team in the league over the past two years. Can they make easy work of it, or will they trap themselves?
Fast Facts
| Puck Drop | October 31st @ 7:00 p.m. Rogers Arena, Vancouver, BC |
| Broadcast | TV: Sportsnet (National) Radio: Sportsnet 590 The FAN Online: Sportsnet+ |
| Gameday Odds (Market Typical) | Maple Leafs -167, Canucks +142 Maple Leafs -1.5 +147, Canucks +1.5 -174 Goal Line 6.5 (Over -140, Under +120) |
About the Maple Leafs (7-6-2)
The see-saw of emotions with this team is beyond comprehension before we even got to the quarter season mark. They’ve gone from mess, to wagon, back to mess in just the span of a couple of weeks. A goaltending disasterclass of the last two games – particularly their loss to Seattle – hasn’t helped things very much.
What could help is some return from injuries in the skater group – keep reading for a little more thought on that.
About the Canucks (3-11-1)
No team is trying to lose in this league. At least, no coaching staff, no roster of players are. But man, if there was a team that has minimal consequences to their actions if they don’t win right now, it would be the Canucks. With very little to show for the most-departed core of their last playoff appearance, this is a team that could use a marquee young star, and the best way to do that is the draft.
So if there’s a team that can feel a little sympathy for them, it’s probably the Leafs, given that they played their way to a decisive 32nd place finish last year only to lose the draft lottery to a Toronto team 20 points above them. With Gavin McKenna in hand, the Leafs might feel a little guilt, but not regret after the Canucks managed to somehow lose both lotteries last year. This year, they’ve been even worse out of the gate – not even a surprising bounce-back season from Elias Pettersson (forward) has kept them away from a 0.233 record thus far. With that said, they managed to come back from a 4-1 deficit to beat the Ducks in overtime a few nights ago, so nothing is guranteed against them.
Projected Lineups
| Toronto Maple Leafs Lines | Vancouver Canucks Lines |
|---|---|
| Gavin McKenna – Auston Matthews – Jack Roslovic Eason Cowan – Nick Paul – William Nylander Dakota Joshua – Colton Sissons – Vinni Lettieri Brandon Duhaime – Teddy Blueger – Zack MacEwen Jake McCabe – Darren Raddysh Morgan Rielly – Chris Tanev Oliver Ekman-Larsson – Troy Stecher | Jake Debrusk – Elias Pettersson (40) – Brock Boeser Liam Ohgren – Marco Rossi – Linus Karlsson Drew O’Connor – Jacob Quillan – Jonathan Lekkerimaki Paul Cotter – Max Sasson – Arshdeep Bains Elias Pettersson (25) – Filip Hronek Jamie Oleksiak – Tom Willander Zeev Buium – Victor Mancini |
| Starting Goalie: Anthony Stolarz 4-1-0, 2.79 GAA, 0.906 SV% Backing Up: Sergei Bobrovsky | Starting Goalie: Kevin Lankinen 1-7-0, 6.16 GAA, 0.807 SV% Backing Up: Leevi Merilainen |
Toronto gets two reinforcements up front in Joshua and Tanev (we’ll talk about that more in a couple paragraphs), likely sending Bo Groulx and Dakota Mermis out of the lineup. Beyond that, not much is expected to blend in the makeup of the group. Much will be made of this being a potential “win and you can run with it for a bit” night for Anthony Stolarz in goal, but do the new Leafs brass have the guts to put Sergei Bobrovsky on his heels right away if needed?
Looking across the hall, it’s tough sledding in Vancouver right now. Outside of their top line and a couple of defencemen, this collection of young secondary guys and veteran depth talent is as “rebuilding team” as the Leafs have seen all year. Linus Karlsson has had a bit of a pop to start his season with nine points in 15 games, but when your breakout guy outside of the top line is bursting out with a 49-point pace, that’s not a team that’s going to do a lot of damage.
Jacob Quillan, traded to the Cancuks by the Leafs two weeks ago, makes his Canucks debut tonight. Leading up to this, he’s had seven points (5G 2A) in five games with the Abbotsford Canucks of the AHL.
Last Matchup
Toronto’s last game against the Canucks was a rather mundane 3-2 shootout in back on the last day of January. None of the Leafs’ goals in open play were scored by players who are in the current lineup – Nic Roy scored Toronto’s 1-1 equalizer in the second, and Max Domi scored their 2-2 equalizer in the third, with the Leafs ultimately winning in the shootout on goals from William Nylander and Auston Matthews, who are very much still here. Perhaps the most unique thing about this game was the overtime penalty shot taken by Matthews after a bit of interference from Conor Garland – obviously unsuccessful, but Matthews would get his revenge with the shootout winnner.
Injuries Of Note
The Maple Leafs may have two former Canucks returning to their lineup tonight, with both Chris Tanev and Dakota Joshua looking ready to go following a Friday practice. Tanev has missed the last three weeks with an upper-body injury, while Joshua would be making his season debut after recovering from a “core” injury suffered last year. Joshua played in four conditioning games with the Marlies and if we can be honest, didn’t really stand out in them, so the hope would be that playing in an environment that matches the pace he’s more familiar with will be to his benefit.
The Canucks are without Thatcher Demko, who has been recovering from hip surgery since January, and Filip Chytil, who has been in and out of the lineup with different upper body injuries for most of the past two seasons, and once again was placed on IR yesterday.
Streaks Of Note
- The Canucks take this matchup seriously, even when they aren’t so good. In fact, they’ve won six of the last ten between these two teams, though Toronto swept the season series last year.
- While betting markets lean towards this game clearing the total goals over, this is usually a pretty stingy matchup. There hasn’t been a Leafs-Canucks game with more than five goals scored in it since January 2024.
- As previously, Auston Matthews remains the Maple Leaf on the hottest run right now, with 8 goals, 9 assists, 17 points and 28 shots on goal in his last ten games. He leads the team in all of the first three metrics, while William Nylander has the most shots with 30.
- Jack Roslovic should not be dismissed either, with eleven points in his last ten. Easton Cowan also sits at 10 points in his last 10, meaning Toronto is getting a nice wave of secondary scoring at the moment. On the flip side, no dressed defeneman other than Troy Stecher has scored a goal in their last ten.
- Elias Pettersson (forward) has been veering towards “back” status this year, making plays we haven’t seen from him in years and scoring a team-leading sixteen points in fifteen games out of the gate. Jonathan Lekkerimaki, no longer a rookie by definition but effectively playing his first full season with the team, has impressed with six goals and six assists in 15 games.
- No matter how much discourse we can have about Toronto’s goalies, be thankful they’re not letting in six a game and posting a save percentage in the low 0.800’s like we project to see from Kevin Lankinen tonight. Of course, now that I say this, be on shutout watch in the home crease.
Early Thoughts
On paper, this is a heavily favoured win for the Maple Leafs. From the narrative end on this coast, it’s a win they need to rise up for after a week of frustrations. On the other side, though, as much as the city of Vancouver has rallied around an aggressive rebuild, hosting the Leafs has always been treated like a must-win, and the crowd, players and staff will all have extra juice tonight. As bad as the Canucks have been, they’ve stolen a couple wins here and there and have given some good teams real scares. This is not a game to take lightly, and they should expect it to be a high-energy affair.
