William Nylander

[GoonieFace]

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.

Just curious, is Nylander on the ice by himself? Or is he with 2 of the slowest players on earth?

 

[GoonieFace]

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

Made a couple of real nice rushes, set up Tavares who missed an open net, ya he was sleeping

 

[IPS]

Just curious, is Nylander on the ice by himself? Or is he with 2 of the slowest players on earth?

All credit to Tavares in the fact that he always goes to the front of the net to take punishment, but when it comes to the open ice he is painfully slow for playoff hockey.

 

[sunstersun]

Willy drove it to the the net multiple times. He also had some rushes.

Tavares is a legit anchor. We need to rebuild the 2nd line around Willy. A new 2C and a new actual 2LW.

 

[JT AM da real deal]

Made a couple of real nice rushes, set up Tavares who missed an open net, ya he was sleeping

He always does da perimeter rushes up da ice .. last night even he admitted after game he didn't go to net .. but you are right we had 3 great chances to score Knies, Matty and JT .. 1 of those 3 score on outstanding chances and that was an OT game .. when I watch Willy what I watch is his defensive play (and more specifically his backcheck) when he plays a beasting game he goes both ways .. last night like on 2nd goal against he was a no show .. not saying he could have caught either Cat but at least try for F8ck sakes

 

[notDatsyuk]

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.

Perfectly ordinary 2on2 with a third player coming in late. As the forward coming back, do you:

A - cover the trailer in case of a drop pass?
B - assume one of your D will suddenly forget how to play a simple 2on2, and leave your man open to go help?

 

[GoonieFace]

He always does da perimeter rushes up da ice .. last night even he admitted after game he didn't go to net .. but you are right we had 3 great chances to score Knies, Matty and JT .. 1 of those 3 score on outstanding chances and that was an OT game .. when I watch Willy what I watch is his defensive play (and more specifically his backcheck) when he plays a beasting game he goes both ways .. last night like on 2nd goal against he was a no show .. not saying he could have caught either Cat but at least try for F8ck sakes

It was a 2 on 2 rush, that McCabe butchered. Technically the centre has the 3rd man, if there is one, but there wasn’t anyone else up on that play.

 

[GoonieFace]

All credit to Tavares in the fact that he always goes to the front of the net to take punishment, but when it comes to the open ice he is painfully slow for playoff hockey.

Once in the offensive zone, Tavares is great. But in all other aspects he is lost, especially defensively, add Patches to that, and Florida can just skate circles around them

 

[notDatsyuk]

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

I'm impressed - Matthews played almost 74 minutes in 2 games!

Or maybe those stats aren't from the two games in Florida that is the topic?

 

[KAWAIlllI]

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.

”Pretty good”

 

[arso40]

I'm impressed - Matthews played almost 74 minutes in 2 games!

Or maybe those stats aren't from the two games in Florida that is the topic?

I’m glad someone else noticed he completely changed the conversation with adding the whole series in and not the two games where they dictate the matchups

 

[arso40]

”Pretty good”

Not Matthews and marner need to step up and win us a game for a change…….no theyre gonna talk about the fluke shot from the corner by marner or anything that Knies makes happen point total doesn’t begin to explain impact those lines need to go in the blender on the road

 

[KAWAIlllI]

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

Don Cherry, the courageous Canuck and CAPS LOCK strikes again with wild takes and ”likes”

 

[Jojalu]

He always does da perimeter rushes up da ice .. last night even he admitted after game he didn't go to net .. but you are right we had 3 great chances to score Knies, Matty and JT .. 1 of those 3 score on outstanding chances and that was an OT game .. when I watch Willy what I watch is his defensive play (and more specifically his backcheck) when he plays a beasting game he goes both ways .. last night like on 2nd goal against he was a no show .. not saying he could have caught either Cat but at least try for F8ck sakes

He went straight to the net twice. What are you talking about?

One was straight to the net from the blueline, and the other he started from the outside and cut in right across the front of the net.

 

[JT AM da real deal]

He went straight to the net twice. What are you talking about?

One was straight to the net from the blueline, and the other he started from the outside and cut in right across the front of the net.

Listen to his post game .. he says quite clearly he thought he could have gone to net more aggressively .. due is quite bright .. but some games he lacks "best man on ice" ambition

 

[Jojalu]

Listen to his post game .. he says quite clearly he thought he could have gone to net more aggressively .. due is quite bright .. but some games he lacks "best man on ice" ambition

On the PP maybe I thought he was a little too pass happy, but I am not sure what he could have done differently on his partials.

I also like that Willy makes zero excuses and puts the responsibility on his shoulders.

No one else on the team had chancea like him driving the net, except Knies who missed the net SH

 

[ITM]

Looking forward to Nylander upping his surprise factor with an uncharacteristic focus on the heels of Tkachuk's threat.

Also looking forward to Benoit, OEL, Tanev and McCabe's as well.

F*** Florida.

 

[notDatsyuk]

Listen to his post game .. he says quite clearly he thought he could have gone to net more aggressively .. due is quite bright .. but some games he lacks "best man on ice" ambition

Saying he could have gone to the net more does not mean he didn't go at all.

 

[thewave]

All credit to Tavares in the fact that he always goes to the front of the net to take punishment, but when it comes to the open ice he is painfully slow for playoff hockey.

JT has been steady. Not great not bad but predictably good I think. Patches tired out and that dragged the line down a bit. Nylander was good, some times he could have shown more tenacity but the game was pretty emotional so he could have been on a low moment.

 

[Gary Nylund]

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.

Nice backhanded jab from the biggest Nylander hater. Aren't you even a little bit embarrassed to constantly post this sort of garbage?

More accurate to say that he was pretty good, he's been amazing up until now and it's not him that needs "a pass". Hope the rest of them pick it up on Wednesday because while Nylander is amazing, expecting him to beat Florida by himself is a bit much.

 

[arso40]

Nice backhanded jab from the biggest Nylander hater. Aren't you even a little bit embarrassed to constantly post this sort of garbage?

More accurate to say that he was pretty good, he's been amazing up until now and it's not him that needs "a pass". Hope the rest of them pick it up on Wednesday because while Nylander is amazing, expecting him to beat Florida by himself is a bit much.

That guy is who he is what do you expect ??

 

[arso40]

Listen to his post game .. he says quite clearly he thought he could have gone to net more aggressively .. due is quite bright .. but some games he lacks "best man on ice" ambition

So cause the others won’t say it that means their obsolved?

 

[pcruz]

Just curious, is Nylander on the ice by himself? Or is he with 2 of the slowest players on earth?

You would agree with me that Nylander is the best skater on the team, yes?
He is also the forward that is furthest back as he's passing the puck to the other forwards who are straddling the blue line.
Tavares has never been a great skater, and he's covered by 2 defenders.

It's also on the player who coughs up the puck to try and make amends.

Now, the play goes back as a 2 on 1 with the 2nd defender tracking back. Those 2 defenders made a meal out of the play, really. And yet, there was no scoring chance on the rush as Bennet has to track back and into the slot for the shot that goes in.
There was enough time for Nylander to have caught up with Bennet and either forced him to shoot the puck from the initial bad angle or risk getting tied up.

But the problem with Nylander that is not shared with the other top 3 forwards is that he is very much prone to having no energy in defensive situations. This was clearly illustrated in overtime the game previous as well.

It's merely an effort issue.
Really not a whole lot the coaching staff can do about it.
They really can't even attempt to shelter the player from this.

Yeah, they started shifting the matchup in Game 3.


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.

Game 3 and 4 opponents for Nylander and his performance against them.
Specifically Barkov and Lundell.

	ToI	Shots	S A	GF	GA	Chances For	CA	HDCF	HDCA
Game 3 vs Barkov	10:16	4	10	1	0	2	8	2	3
Game 3 vs Lundell	5:00	5	3	0	1	2	2	1	0
Game 4 vs Barkov	8:30	3	7	0	0	3	7	3	2
Game 4 vs Lundell	6:37	7	3	0	0	14	2	11	0
Total vs Barkov	18:46	7	17	1	0	5	15	5	5
Total vs Lundell	11:37	12	6	0	1	16	4	14	0

 

[BraveCanadian]

On the PP maybe I thought he was a little too pass happy, but I am not sure what he could have done differently on his partials.

I also like that Willy makes zero excuses and puts the responsibility on his shoulders.

No one else on the team had chancea like him driving the net, except Knies who missed the net SH

The PP definitely needs to stop screwing around and get pucks to the net any way they can. They are back to being so slow and predictable. Quick decisions, a couple of passes, and crash the net.

 

[sunstersun]

The PP definitely needs to stop screwing around and get pucks to the net any way they can. They are back to being so slow and predictable. Quick decisions, a couple of passes, and crash the net.

The drop pass wasting 20 seconds a powerplay is disgusting.