Pre-Game Talk: Leafs @ Panthers - Game 3 - Sunday 6:30 pm EST

[The Hanging Jowl]

Just throwing this out there:

It's entirely possible we could see a Stanley Cup final featuring a team backstopped by Freddie Andersen facing another team with Jack Campbell in net. Enjoy your Saturday!

 

[IPS]

Zero chance any coach worth their salt puts Tavares on the 4th line. That's emotional fan talk. Not knowledgeable hockey talk.

No offense to JT but he has been by far the worst of the big 4 in these playoffs.

 

[57 Years No Cup]

That's literally the exact opposite of true.
Against Florida, the Leafs have averaged 0.12 expected goals per shot. That would rank us 1st in the league in the regular season, and 2nd in the playoffs.
Against Florida, the Leafs have averaged 37 scoring chances per game. That would rank us 1st in the league in the regular season, and 2nd in the playoffs.
Against Florida, the Leafs have averaged 18 high danger chances per game. That would rank us 1st in the league in the regular season, and 1st in the playoffs.

Which, once again, proves "advanced" stats are junk.

 

[Dekes For Days]

Which, once again, proves "advanced" stats are junk.

They're not junk, of course. And scoring chances and high danger chances aren't even particularly advanced. Matches perfectly with the eye test of the last two games as well.
We've gotten a ton of top tier chances over the past two games, and our average shot has been very high quality.

 

[Nooodles]

The horse is scratched lol

 

[leafs in five]

I can't even be mad about the non-saturday night game due to the 30 mins early start on Sunday. 11:30pm vs midnight UK start is just a world of difference,

 

[Mess]

The Bad News:

Based on Historical NHL results a team that does down 0-2 in a series has only come back to win 13% of the time.

The Good News:

While Bobrovsky is currently playing up to his former Vezina trophy form and Panthers like their 2021-22 President's trophy team, we all now that goalie Bob can go overnight from the best goalie in the World, to almost unplayable letting in everything.

So while the odds are bleak, hope remains alive that this is not over yet.

 

[AllHeartNoSkill]

The Bad News:

Based on Historical NHL results a team that does down 0-2 in a series has only come back to win 13% of the time.

The Good News:

While Bobrovsky is currently playing up to his former Vezina trophy form and Panthers like their 2021-22 President's trophy team, we all now that goalie Bob can go overnight from the best goalie in the World, to almost unplayable letting in everything.

So while the odds are bleak, hope remains alive that this is not over yet.

Another consideration: Leafs definitely win tomorrow simply because they’d never put us out of our misery quickly.

 

[Dekes For Days]

Last year, 3 teams came back from 2 game deficits to win a series (NYR, NYR, Tampa).
This year, in just the first round, we had 2 teams come back from 2 game deficits to win a series (Florida, NJ).
This isn't the old NHL. Series is far from over.

 

[Clark4Ever]

We have outplayed Florida in both games so far and deserve to be up 2-0 in the series or tied 1-1 at the very least. We've had terrible puck luck and Bobrovsky has been incredible.

Yes, some of our key players need to be better but overall, I'm not upset at the performance of our team. If we continue playing the way we have, our luck is bound to change.

 

[Dog]

Have to win or it's game over no pressure of course!

 

[Kiwi]

This is a symptom of a larger issue in the world but that's all I'll say about that.


Bob's save percentage is so high because the shots he is facing are easy to save.

That's incorrect

He's faced a ton of high quality chances from within the slot area from some of our best players

 

[IPS]

Last year, 3 teams came back from 2 game deficits to win a series (NYR, NYR, Tampa).
This year, in just the first round, we had 2 teams come back from 2 game deficits to win a series (Florida, NJ).
This isn't the old NHL. Series is far from over.

The team has zero issues stringing wins together, they won 3 straight against Tampa to get their 3-1 series lead. Zero reason whatsoever they can't do something similar this series against what appears to be an inferior team.

 

[Gallagbi]

The team has zero issues stringing wins together, they won 3 straight against Tampa to get their 3-1 series lead. Zero reason whatsoever they can't do something similar this series against what appears to be an inferior team.

We're in a hole and that hole is tougher to climb out of than even ground, but its not impossible.

Sadly when were down you have a number of posters agenda pushing their bullshit trying to back door into "I told you so narratives"

 

[All Mod Cons]

We're in a hole and that hole is tougher to climb out of than even ground, but its not impossible.

Sadly when were down you have a number of posters agenda pushing their bullshit trying to back door into "I told you so narratives"

Nargenda.

 

[Jimmy Firecracker]

 

[QJo]

No offense to JT but he has been by far the worst of the big 4 in these playoffs.

That's a much more reasonable take. And don't worry about giving offense to a star athlete. You don't worry about giving offense do you? Unless you think what you say could offend him and that offense could materially affect our chances of winning in which case as fans the least (and arguably the most) we can do is not be offensive to our own players so as to not affect their mindset negatively heading into a game.

 

[Aashir]

Don’t mind it to be honest. He can move the puck and we desperately need that from the blue line. Rielly is the only guy currently who can do it. Just play him in favourable matchups and use him offensively and he should be alright

 

[IPS]

Are they actually replacing Gio or going 11-7?

 

[leafsfan5]

Why are we playing both ZAR/Lafferty if they suck and only play like 5-7 minutes?

Run 11-7 and ride the stars to the ground. They are the ones who determine if we win or lose

 

[QJo]

Tavares is so ineffective 5 on 5 you might as well just have him out as a PP specialist and if that means having 3 other skating lines and not wasting Nylander when he's on his game. Other than faceoffs and an offensive eruption every 3-4 games, there's not a lot going on with JT. Which is a sad thing to say not even a week after he scored the biggest Leaf goal in decades.

If he is sitting on the bench 5v5 who is out in his place that is an improvement? He's not better than anyone on the team 5v5? This is wild. Talk about over analyzing.

 

[Gary Nylund]

Every single team in the league has the potential to win round 1 if they want it enough. Pretenders get phased out as playoffs continue,

Leafs never seemed to want it enough that's why they lose to all assortments of difficulties: Boston (hard) Jackets (medium) Habs (easier than easy). This season they looked like they wanted it more than Tampa. Tampa looks toast.

All that failure created a myth that winning round 1 suddenly proves we are a success. All I see is a team playing ugly hockey primed to get booted from the playoffs. 0-2 start to the Panthers is tangible evidence this is true (aka to this point Leafs fall in the pretender category and are getting phased out now).

Tampa carried the play to us most of the time and we won because Sammy outplayed Vasi so saying "TB looks toast" to me is just weird.

We mostly carried the play against MTL but Price stole the series for them so saying we lost because we didn't "want it enough" is again, weird.

The Leafs playoff history only goes to prove the old adage that in the playoffs, the goalie is the most important player on the team.

The last paragraph is perhaps the weirdest of all. This "proves we are a success" is nothing more than a strawman. Success isn't a black/white label that you either have or you don't, unless you want to call the cup winner a success and everyone else failure. Against TB we had success, against FLA we haven't (not yet anyway), what happens tomorrow is anybody's guess. Beating TB proves nothing other than the fact that the idiots saying we could never win a round were wrong and that I'm happy for, it was always an incredibly stupid thing to say yet as the losses piled up, they kept chirping. And I don't WTF you're watching when you say you see a team "playing ugly hockey". We mostly carried the play against FLA both games and both games were tough battles where we kept fighting until the end. We made some mistakes but not as many as FLA did and their goalie played so well that they were able to win both games. We were dominant for long stretches though and we really need to keep playing the we way we have been for the most part but cut down on the stupid giveaways and we can still win this thing.

A little condescending considering they've done it once in 7 tries, and are now down 0-2 don't you think?

They win on Sunday and they're back in the series, but there's quite a hole that they have dug for themselves.

So many people said this team would never win a round, they were (finally) proven wrong. What's condescending about pointing out this simple truth?

 

[AvroArrow]

I'm dropping $10 on the Panthers to win the series, did the same thing last series for Tampa, Leafs won in 6. The hockey gods are angry that we've been rooting for their success, a sacrifice is necessary to earn their favor again. $10 on Florida for the series, Leafs will probably win 4 in a row.

 

[A1LeafNation]

Perhaps we don't change anything.

Maybe Marner Matthews and Nylander don't contribute to boneheaded giveaways and Samsonov doesn't give up boneheaded goals next time.

The rest of game went as best as you can hope for.

 

[ThrowDemTongs]

I'm dropping $10 on the Panthers to win the series, did the same thing last series for Tampa, Leafs won in 6. The hockey gods are angry that we've been rooting for their success, a sacrifice is necessary to earn their favor again. $10 on Florida for the series, Leafs will probably win 4 in a row.

What's the payout on that?