Toronto Maple Leafs vs. San Jose Sharks – Game #42 Preview, Projected Lines & TV Info

Puck Drop: 7:00 p.m. EST  |  Arena: Air Canada Centre |  TV: Sportsnet |  Radio: SN 590

Game Day Quotes

Mike Babcock on pushing the pace against San Jose:

Well, I think they do a good job of that, too. They play fast, they do a real good job staying patient and being above you, and then their transition game’s real good. So we’re going to have to execute quickly so we can get going in a hurry. The first ten minutes of the game, where everyone’s tight on you, if you can execute early and get your game established first, obviously it’s a huge priority. So that’ll be our focus here tonight.

Babcock on where he feels the team is defensively this year:

Well, we’re tenth [on the PK}. I checked the standings this morning and D.J said we’re tenth, so we’re not good enough, how’s that? Tonight, we’re facing the team that has the best special teams in the national league. If you combine them together, I think they’re (5th) and (2nd).

Just in general I think our defensive game on a regular basis is good and then suddenly we don’t have F3, we turn the puck over and then there’s these sections of our game where if you’re me, you wonder who coaches the team. So that’s the consistent part of your game that you need to do everyday. You need to do it when you’ve got no legs. You need to do it when you played the day before, and you need to do it when your’e fresh. You need to do it all the time.

Babcock on the team’s energy level:

Good. I don’t think there’s any issue. I thought when we played five in seven that was our lowest point energy wise. I thought we had good energy last game. Even when we made mistakes, I thought we had good energy. I think the interesting thing about today’s national league is every night you play you look at the other team and go ‘woah, are they ever good’. That’s every single night.

San Jose head coach Pete Deboer on the Sharks penalty kill:

We ran a penalty kill in New Jersey. I had Dave Barr on my staff there and we were number one in the league. I think we had a modern day record the one year we went to the Stanley Cup final for PK% in a season. You know, after I moved on, we went with some different philosophies; kind of got away from what we were doing there. We just thought the game was changing. I re-hired Dave and we went back to that and I really think that’s made a big difference. He’s done a great job implementing it.

Matchup Stats

Toronto Maple Leafs Projected Lineup

*We have added goal, assist, and point totals for each player below the lines. Total goals per line are indicated, too, as well as save percentage for goalies.

Forwards

Hyman – Matthews – Nylander
  (41-7-14-21) – (31-17-14-31) – (41-8-20-28) Total: 32
Marleau – Kadri – Komarov
(41-15-9-24) – (39-13-10-23) – (40-4-6-10)  Total: 32
Van Riemsdyk – Bozak – Marner
  (40-17-10-27) – (40-7-13-20) – (41-5-24-29) Total: 29
Martin – Gauthier – Brown
 (39-3-7-9) – (1-0-0-0) – (41-10-6-16)  Total: 13

Defencemen

Rielly – Hainsey
 (41-4-24-27) – (41-3-13-16) Total: 7
Gardiner – Carrick
 (41-3-16-19) – (22-2-2-4) Total: 5
Borgman – Polak
(39-2-7-9) – (22-2-5-5) Total: 4

Goaltenders

Andersen (.921 sv%)
McElhinney (.916 sv%)

Scratched: Moore, Marincin
Injured: Soshnikov, Zaitsev

San Jose Sharks Projected Lineup

Forwards

Meier– Thornton – Pavelski
  (36-8-4-12) – (37-8-19-27) – (37-8-16-24) Total: 24
Hertl – Couture – Donskoi
(37-10-12-22) – (33-15-11-26) – (31-8-6-14) Total: 33
Boedker – Tierney – Labanc
  (30-3-6-9) – (37-8-6-14) – (32-4-16-20) Total: 15
Sorensen – Ward – Karlsson
 (12-3-0-3) – (31-4-4-8) – (31-5-5-10) Total: 12

Defencemen

Dillon – Burns
 (36-0-6-6) – (37-6-20-26) Total: 6
Vlasic – Braun
 (36-4-7-11) – (37-1-15-16) Total: 5
Ryan – Demelo
 (28-0-3-3) – (21-0-5-5) Total: 0

Goaltenders

 Jones (.914 sv%)
Dell (.934 sv%)