William Nylander

[KAWAIlllI]

Lesson for the idiots who only parrot the offensive production of players in the playoffs and completely ignore their whole game performance.

Willy has now been responsible for 2 of the last 3 goals against.

1 was an OT goal where he didn't even attempt to pressure or defend.
1 was a dipsy-doodle in the neutral zone and a grenade pass that got stuffed back for a 2 on 2 and then he just coasted back towards his zone instead of hustling back. The fact that Bennet had to make a move and cut into the middle of the ice means he could have caught up and broken the play.


In order to make up for these 2 braindead plays, he has to contribute to 2 goals. Just to break even.

This is why just plain offensive numbers mean f*** all.

Oh, now I see who I was dealing with yesterday - one of those…

Tonight’s goal is not on Nylander. That puck needs to be deflected down into the zone, which was the intended play, clearly. You would know this is you’ve played hockey.

Last games OT goal was on Tavares who couldn’t get it out of the zone when his line was completely gassed.

Keep blanking Will all you like, but your agenda is pretty obvious

 

[arso40]

Oh, now I see who I was dealing with yesterday - one of those…

Tonight’s goal is not on Nylander. That puck needs to be deflected down into the zone, which was the intended play, clearly. You would know this is you’ve played hockey.

Last games OT goal was on Tavares who couldn’t get it out of the zone when his line was completely gassed.

Keep blanking Will all you like, but your agenda is pretty obvious

If Willy doesn’t carry this team it’s going nowhere fitting our top line couldn’t out duel their third line and Willy is the topic of discussion…….

 

[ZEBROA]

Ottawa and Florida are chalk and cheese.

He's also getting 71% OZS, compared to Matthews @ 52% against Barkov, mostly in the last 4 games.


He's been a timely goal scorer, and his talent is obvious, but some of the crap he does away from the puck sends you up the wall. Bad line changes, flybys, bad coverage, turnovers (like the 2-0 tonight).

He's got to clean it up.

Id blame the turnover on both Tavares and Nylander. And then the rest for not manage it better. So the whole line. Could he have made a safer pass, yes. If it worked could that have been a free lane for mccabe(way to high up), yes.

Shit happens and goals you create. We need Matthews to create goals, no matter were he start his shifts.

 

[Skullz]

Nylander criticism is ridiculous. Florida has hard matched him with Barkov line and Forsling pairing - and he still generated easily the most chances of any of our forwards.
Marner and Matthews need to start tilting the ice 5 v 5.

Also take Jarnkrok out. He’s useless. Give Robertson or Kampf a look.

 

[arso40]

That's a pretty embarrassing goal against to try and throw biased shade on Willy. If you're going to troll, pick your punches at least.

I love McCabe, but boy was that ever a blooper. Poor Tanev couldn't believe it.

Nylander and Knies were the only great forwards tonight. Lotty was modestly moving as well from what I noticed.

Tonight or this series ?throw in patches ……the big boys got secondary matchups that Willy’s been feasting on this whole round for some reason they couldn’t do anything with where’s all the loud guys talkin about secondary matchups what’s the excuse for marner and the top line now?

 

[Stephen]

If Willy doesn’t carry this team it’s going nowhere fitting our top line couldn’t out duel their third line and Willy is the topic of discussion…….

Yeah Willie has been carrying more than his fair share to get this series at 2-2.

 

[Gabriel426]

Yeah Willie has been carrying more than his fair share to get this series at 2-2.

Not to mention carrying the Leafs in Round One.

If it not for Rantanen.
The whole League will be talking about how great Willie is this playoffs.

 

[KAWAIlllI]

It’s going to be interesting to hear how Kypreos is gonna put this loss on Nylander, while praising Marner and Matthews defensive game again

 

[The Shadow]

A pass to Tavares that led to a 2 on 2 that McCabe misplayed, really reaching here to blame him

I’m just noticing a trend and when I watch him I don’t feel confident in his defensive abilities

 

[Nineteen67]

Nylander just doesn’t get it and doesn’t know how to fight through it.

 

[thewave]

Nylander just doesn’t get it and doesn’t know how to fight through it.

He has been great Vs top opposition and being paid special attention to. Its not his problem that Berube doesnt knows how to make adjustments on the fly.

Marner was doing nothing and he just keeps running it over and over and over.

 

[Jojalu]

Nylander just doesn’t get it and doesn’t know how to fight through it.

I would argue he absolutely gets it.

When space is tough to find, he just finds ways to break through and drive the net, like he did 3 times last night making something out of nothing. He and Knies pretty much had the Leafs only chances all night.

 

[thewave]

I would argue he absolutely gets it.

When space is tough to find, he just finds ways to break through and drive the net, like he did 3 times last night making something out of nothing. He and Knies pretty much had the Leafs only chances all night.

Yeah exactly. Agree with you here.

 

[KAWAIlllI]

Nylander just doesn’t get it and doesn’t know how to fight through it.

Well that’s certainly a wild take

 

[janesy12]

Nylander just doesn’t get it and doesn’t know how to fight through it.

Yeah the guy that's actually scoring "just doesn't get it".

 

[notDatsyuk]

I’m just noticing a trend and when I watch him I don’t feel confident in his defensive abilities

Which 'trend'? The trend of passing to linemates? The trend of covering the trailer on a simple 2on2? The trend in the previous game of his teammates not clearing the puck?

The trend I see is that of him being blamed unfairly.

 

[Menzinger]

Nylander just doesn’t get it and doesn’t know how to fight through it.

Not sure id agree here. He was driving to the net, one of the few creating legitimate scoring chances when the team needed them.

While I don't think last night was his best performance of the playoffs so far, I find a few of the reactions to it a bit strange.

 

[ACC1224]

Not his best two games but we can give him a pass, he's been pretty good up until now.
Hopefully he picks it up again on Wednesday.

 

[notDatsyuk]

Not his best two games but we can give him a pass, he's been pretty good up until now.
Hopefully he picks it up again on Wednesday.

Not the best two games by any Leafs player.

Still one of the better, if not best, players, as he's been all playoffs.

 

[pcruz]

Oh, now I see who I was dealing with yesterday - one of those…

Tonight’s goal is not on Nylander. That puck needs to be deflected down into the zone, which was the intended play, clearly. You would know this is you’ve played hockey.

Last games OT goal was on Tavares who couldn’t get it out of the zone when his line was completely gassed.

Keep blanking Will all you like, but your agenda is pretty obvious

The puck needs to go INTO the zone.
And when the puck is stuffed back into the Leafs zone, Nylander is the 3rd closest player to his net and has to backcheck.
He didn't get the puck into the offensive zone, and then didn't backcheck.

As always with Nylander, the complaints about him are not related to results. They are 100% effort based complaints.

There is an expectation that a goalie cannot save the puck harder, a player can't shoot the puck harder than their hardest shot, can't deke harder, and that sometimes despite doing everything right, there is a goalie there to stop the shot.

What is always and completely within the control of every player is whether they exert the effort.
And the complaint about Willie is that he simply goes through periods of time where the effort level is minimal.

Nylander criticism is ridiculous. Florida has hard matched him with Barkov line and Forsling pairing - and he still generated easily the most chances of any of our forwards.
Marner and Matthews need to start tilting the ice 5 v 5.

Also take Jarnkrok out. He’s useless. Give Robertson or Kampf a look.

https://www.naturalstattrick.com/game.php?season=20242025&game=30214

Seems like Nylander played against Barkov for 8:30 last night.
He was on the ice for 3 goal scoring chances for (all high danger scoring chances), and 7 goal scoring chances against (2 of which were high danger)

Interestingly enough, Nylander feasted on the 3rd line of Florida (not the 1st line as claimed) with a stat line against Marchand that looks like:

7:55 played, 15 scoring chances for (of which 12 were high danger), 2 scoring chances against (0 high danger)

The statline against Lundell is almost exactly the same.

 

[pcruz]

You guys do know that Maurice put Barkov line on Nylander now right? He's been using Lundell against Matthews because right now Matthews couldn't score on a soccer net and Mitch is a soft perimeter player, they're not afraid of that line and don't respect it. They had no answer against Nylander in the first two games so Maurice adjusted accordingly.

Let's see how the actual usage has been this series:

This is for all situations, including PP and PK

https://www.naturalstattrick.com/game.php?season=20242025&game=30210

	TOI	Shots	Shots Against	Chances For	Chances Against	High Danger For	High Danger Against	Goals For	Goals Against
Nylander vs Barkov	26:42	11	20	12	19	7	7	1	1
Nylander vs Lundell	24:09	16	14	21	11	14	3	1	2
Matthews vs Barkov	45:40	18	24	22	34	12	12	5	2
Matthews vs Lundell	28:13	13	5	21	9	13	3	1	0

 

[arso40]

Not sure id agree here. He was driving to the net, one of the few creating legitimate scoring chances when the team needed them.

While I don't think last night was his best performance of the playoffs so far, I find a few of the reactions to it a bit strange.

The trend here is if Willy doesn’t scoring we don’t win kinda makes you wonder why he isn’t line 1 that other line only helps they can’t lead and if they didn’t have Knies they would be the laughing stocc of the league

 

[arso40]

Let's see how the actual usage has been this series:

This is for all situations, including PP and PK

https://www.naturalstattrick.com/game.php?season=20242025&game=30210

	TOI	Shots	Shots Against	Chances For	Chances Against	High Danger For	High Danger Against	Goals For	Goals Against
Nylander vs Barkov	26:42	11	20	12	19	7	7	1	1
Nylander vs Lundell	24:09	16	14	21	11	14	3	1	2
Matthews vs Barkov	45:40	18	24	22	34	12	12	5	2
Matthews vs Lundell	28:13	13	5	21	9	13	3	1	0

Bro they literally changed it since they’ve been home you realize that right?

 

[Skullz]

Let's see how the actual usage has been this series:

This is for all situations, including PP and PK

https://www.naturalstattrick.com/game.php?season=20242025&game=30210

	TOI	Shots	Shots Against	Chances For	Chances Against	High Danger For	High Danger Against	Goals For	Goals Against
Nylander vs Barkov	26:42	11	20	12	19	7	7	1	1
Nylander vs Lundell	24:09	16	14	21	11	14	3	1	2
Matthews vs Barkov	45:40	18	24	22	34	12	12	5	2
Matthews vs Lundell	28:13	13	5	21	9	13	3	1	0

Yeah, they started shifting the matchup in Game 3.

The puck needs to go INTO the zone.
And when the puck is stuffed back into the Leafs zone, Nylander is the 3rd closest player to his net and has to backcheck.
He didn't get the puck into the offensive zone, and then didn't backcheck.

As always with Nylander, the complaints about him are not related to results. They are 100% effort based complaints.

There is an expectation that a goalie cannot save the puck harder, a player can't shoot the puck harder than their hardest shot, can't deke harder, and that sometimes despite doing everything right, there is a goalie there to stop the shot.

What is always and completely within the control of every player is whether they exert the effort.
And the complaint about Willie is that he simply goes through periods of time where the effort level is minimal.

https://www.naturalstattrick.com/game.php?season=20242025&game=30214

Seems like Nylander played against Barkov for 8:30 last night.
He was on the ice for 3 goal scoring chances for (all high danger scoring chances), and 7 goal scoring chances against (2 of which were high danger)

Interestingly enough, Nylander feasted on the 3rd line of Florida (not the 1st line as claimed) with a stat line against Marchand that looks like:

7:55 played, 15 scoring chances for (of which 12 were high danger), 2 scoring chances against (0 high danger)

The statline against Lundell is almost exactly the same.

I'm not sure which forwards were on the ice, but I saw his two best chances came against Forsling. I would honestly try and shuffle the top two lines to diffuse the talent. Try Knies or Matthews with Nylander just to make Maurice think about his matchups even more.

 

[JT AM da real deal]

Willy went to sleep in game 4 .. very disappointing .. guy is such an enigma .. something is wrong with his ambition