Post-Game Talk: Leafs win 5-2

[ToneDog]

We've handled playoff teams well at home. Next test is to battle the Bruins, Lightning and Panthers hard on the road. Gonna be a great week of playoff hockey preview. Got a bit of a taste last night and our D did the job. Adding Muzzin to the mix is going to be sweet, not to mention the return of Soup in goal.

 

[ACC1224]

We've handled playoff teams well at home. Next test is to battle the Bruins, Lightning and Panthers hard on the road. Gonna be a great week of playoff hockey preview. Got a bit of a taste last night and our D did the job. Adding Muzzin to the mix is going to be sweet, not to mention the return of Soup in goal.

Is there a timeline for either to return?

 

[Mugzy97]

It was a good win last night but I have 1 question.
the Panthers outshot the Leafs 32-23 and Mrazek was very good last night.
we then beat them 5-2 with only 23 shots so does that mean that Florida dominated us but got Goalie’d or is that only a thing when the Leafs lose

Campbell goalie'd some teams early in the season, but we haven't seen it in a while.

 

[ToneDog]

Is there a timeline for either to return?

Not sure if I heard Soup might be back by the weekend. Muzzin probably closer to mid April earliest. Nothing on Kase. Hope he is doing well because he is a beauty.

 

[bax]

The Panthers had their back up goalie in net not their 10 million dollar star goalie…….so there’s that

Is that the reason the Leafs won? I was at the sens game the night before and Bob didn’t look good at all until overtime.

 

[ULF_55]

Blacked out here, so only watched bits of it via stream.

marner set up 2 Tavares PPG's and set up Mikheyev's goal.

So how was the Tavares line at even strength without marner?

 

[Mess]

We've handled playoff teams well at home. Next test is to battle the Bruins, Lightning and Panthers hard on the road. Gonna be a great week of playoff hockey preview. Got a bit of a taste last night and our D did the job. Adding Muzzin to the mix is going to be sweet, not to mention the return of Soup in goal.

Leafs do play to their level of competition and yesterday they rose to the occasion and played a real solid game all around.

Agreed next big test is matching up on the road when the opposition dicates matchups with last change, and in front of hostile crowds.

 

[Mess]

Blacked out here, so only watched bits of it via stream.

marner set up 2 Tavares PPG's and set up Mikheyev's goal.

So how was the Tavares line at even strength without marner?

I think you mean Tavares line without Nylander?

Willy started on the 3rd line and Mikheyev played in his spot alongside Tavares .. Mitch played with Auston all game.

Tavares line was more involved as JT and Gudas were battling all night,

 

[Mess]

yeah, but we would face the big boy goalie

True but we also might have Campbell as well, so neither team played their playoff starter in this one.

 

[slozo]

you must have had a bad angle , the puck was on the ice on the redirect goal , tremendous play by Marner

I was high up actually - but I was going off the replay on the board, fair enough then.

 

[crump]

That 2nd period was pretty exciting. Leafs were behind and came back on some good aggressive plays, played physical drawing penalties allowing us to take over the game. Marner was dominant everywhere. I though Lyubushkin was going to cream Marchment on that one play. Tavares was battling. Our D had a lot of great work clearing the cease and Giordano has an elite stick in there. D pairings were good. Holl had a good game, took a huge hit to get the puck out to Marner to set up Mikheyev.

 

[ToneDog]

The hit by Marchment on Listerine reminded me of the Perry knee on Tavares. Listerine was lucky contact was made at the shoulder and not his head. Kid dodged a bullet.

 

[Twine Tickler]

call me insane, but Florida is actually not a bad matchup for us in the playoffs in comparison to the other teams. Both teams have tremendous skill, but but both teams also have had no playoff success since the beginning of time. FLA would be the favorite, and we could potentially leverage that dog role.

It's only been 1 game against them at the tail end of their roady, so I will try not to read too much into their game yesterday, but I have long suspected we would match up best against them in comparison to BOS, TB, and CAR. I am thinking about the games we have had to play against CAR and TB this season, and it really feels from a viewers perspective that we had to earn every single inch of ice in those games. I just didn't see that yesterday TBH. There was room to make plays. FLA is high octane and can put up large amounts of goals in no time, but they can also give you good looks. If we played them in the playoffs it really will come down to who makes the least amount of mistakes likely.

Great bounce back win. Really happy for Petr. He was a steadying presence pretty well all game long. Leafs win, Canada clinches WC berth, and Will Smith gives the world something to talk about for days.... It was about as perfect of a Sunday as one could have hoped for.

 

[Captain Crunch]

So ya, guess who got a penalty from this?

Hard to believe if it was us! It’s so obvious he slew-footed our player.

 

[Judas Tavares]

We've handled playoff teams well at home. Next test is to battle the Bruins, Lightning and Panthers hard on the road. Gonna be a great week of playoff hockey preview. Got a bit of a taste last night and our D did the job. Adding Muzzin to the mix is going to be sweet, not to mention the return of Soup in goal.

Finding that this season, our games on the road are fairly hit or miss, so this will be tough. Also we talk about houses of horror such as Buffalo, Vancouver, Long Island. But I think the worst is Florida. Honestly think the team's record there over the last 15 years is abysmal. Don't have the stats to look it up, but I'm sure it is terrible. Always seems like a let down for the Leaf fans who travel there to see them. That being said, I think our barn is a bit of a house of horrors for Florida. I feel like the last time they won here, Trevor Kidd was their goalie

 

[Duffman955]

It was a good win last night but I have 1 question.
the Panthers outshot the Leafs 32-23 and Mrazek was very good last night.
we then beat them 5-2 with only 23 shots so does that mean that Florida dominated us but got Goalie’d or is that only a thing when the Leafs lose

We were outscoring them until the last 5 mins when they pulled their goalie

 

[ULF_55]

I think you mean Tavares line without Nylander?

Willy started on the 3rd line and Mikheyev played in his spot alongside Tavares .. Mitch played with Auston all game.

Tavares line was more involved as JT and Gudas were battling all night,

No, I mean without marner setting up 3 goals that Tavares and Mikheyev scored, how was the Tavares line?

I know Nylander wasn't on the line, but how did the revamped Tavares line do? There can't be credit for the goals as they were all marner setups.

 

[weems]

call me insane, but Florida is actually not a bad matchup for us in the playoffs in comparison to the other teams. Both teams have tremendous skill, but but both teams also have had no playoff success since the beginning of time. FLA would be the favorite, and we could potentially leverage that dog role.

It's only been 1 game against them at their tail end of their roady, so I will try not to read too much into their game yesterday, but I have long suspected we would match up best against them in comparison to BOS, TB, and CAR. I am thinking about the games we have had to play against CAR and TB this season, and it really feels from a viewers perspective that we had to earn every single inch of ice in those games. I just didn't see that yesterday TBH. There was room to make plays. FLA is high octane and can put up large amounts of goals in no time, but they can also give you good looks. If we played them in the playoffs it really will come down to who makes the least amount of mistakes likely.

Great bounce back win. Really happy for Petr. He was a steadying presence pretty well all game long. Leafs win, Canada clinches WC berth, and Will Smith gives the world something to talk about for days.... It was about as perfect of a Sunday as one could have hoped for.

Great win and I agree that Florida would be a good matchup for us.

They give up the 5th most high danger shots against in the league 5v5 whereas a team like Boston is the best at limiting high danger shots against.

Good to see Tavares have a outstanding game and his play will be very important if we want to win 4 playoff rounds.

 

[JT AM da real deal]

Well done boys .. solid game .. 2 points in bank .. remember folks it was a regular season game .. that was not a playoff type game .. game was too slow and Leafs played their possession game with no pressure .. a playoff game will be much faster pace and much more pressure on puck .. which leads to turnovers on teams not willing to pay da price ..

Got give a shout out to Dubie for picking up Lub and Gio .. I can tell these 2 guys can and will play playoff hockey .. in fact they will be 2 guys on backend who will carry squad .. they play like men .. neither are afraid to get wiped out .. you either have it or you don't .. those guys have it you can see it when they are in puck chases .. also I am getting more convinced game by game that Lily will rise up to that level too .. sure he makes tons of rook errors but he also has it .. in fact i think he should be in over Sandin for that job on 3rd pair with Muzzy when he gets back .. this is it folks on back end .. 1st time I can ever say we have what it takes on backend to win a series
Rielly Lub
Gio Brodie
Muzzy Lily

 

[wingman75]

Well, Montreal didn't get to 20 shots on Saturday. We definitely played well enough to win that game but just couldn't bury many chances (and Allen was very good)

Fair, but there was a different level of intensity tonight that would have changed the outcome of that game vs MTL imo. I loved the 1st and 3rd vs MTL, I thought the 2nd was an unacceptable mail-in. Doesn't matter in the big picture I guess.

 

[The Blueprint]

Did even one person prefer Chariot over Giordano?
Sounds like a bit of a made up whine.

Pretty much everyone said the Panthers made a big addition on the blue line and the leafs didn't do enough lol

 

[ACC1224]

Pretty much everyone said the Panthers made a big addition on the blue line and the leafs didn't do enough lol

I must have missed that. Panthers did do a little more at the deadline though.

 

[ULF_55]

I must have missed that. Panthers did do a little more at the deadline though.

And one of the Panthers or the Lightning or both paid too much.

Arms race where there can only be one winner.

 

[Macallan18]

I must have missed that. Panthers did do a little more at the deadline though.

I like the Giroux signing.
A ridiculous number of commentators were hyping Chariot before he was traded, and praised Fla after.
Of course, commentators are idiots.

 

[egd27]

Finding that this season, our games on the road are fairly hit or miss, so this will be tough. Also we talk about houses of horror such as Buffalo, Vancouver, Long Island. But I think the worst is Florida. Honestly think the team's record there over the last 15 years is abysmal. Don't have the stats to look it up, but I'm sure it is terrible. Always seems like a let down for the Leaf fans who travel there to see them. That being said, I think our barn is a bit of a house of horrors for Florida. I feel like the last time they won here, Trevor Kidd was their goalie

I think part of that is due to a couple of factors.

1. We were crap for 10 of those 15 years
2. Seems like almost every road game against the Panthers is the second game of a 2b2 after playing Tampa the night before