That was a very ugly game. Reminiscent of the Columbus series where Toronto got so psyched up to play a defensively responsible game that they no showed on the offensive side.
Matthews scored, but there's something off about the spacing on the whole Matthews-Marner-Thornton line. They all seem to want to converge to where the puck is and end up getting in each other's kitchens to the point where they're falling over each other and losing track of the puck. When they do have the puck they seem to hesitate on who to defer to. Got to clean things up and have a coherent game plan out there.
Matthews also seems to be all over the ice, but not in an effective way. As a counterpoint, Leon Draisatl seems like a high volume production guy who doesn't do very much, and when he has the puck takes it to the net in straight lines while staying 'big' to protect the puck. Clean up the approach.
Nylander is moving the puck well, but he hesitates to go right to the net. The stop ups and skating behind the net is not really the most effective play.
Kerfoot is skating really well and handling the puck really well, but unfortunately has zero offensive touch and doesn't like the heavy traffic eras. Mikheyev's ability to rag the puck is fantastic but you wish he would show a little more scoring touch and creativity once he gets there.
Tavares had his worst game yet. Looked more like the 2020 version than the 2019 and 2021 version we've seen so far.
Holl was amazing tonight vs McDavid. The skating, reach, stick positioning was top notch.