Sheldon Keefe addressed the media after his team’s 3-0 win over the Ottawa Senators which improved the Leafs’ record to 45-20-10.
On the message to the team after the first period:
We needed to up our intensity. We talked about it before the game. It was going to be playoff-like intensity from Ottawa. They certainly brought that.
I didn’t think we matched it. I don’t think we were poor or anything like that, but we just didn’t have the necessary intensity to get on the right side of the puck to generate any sort of meaningful offense.
On Radim Zohorna contributing a goal in his Leafs debut:
Very limited ice, so it was hard for me — especially with 11 forwards — to find where and when to use him. Certainly, with his effort tonight, he earned some trust. He scored a goal.
I think he ended up getting 20% of our shots tonight in very limited ice time. It shows that he was doing good things when he was out there.
On Ilya Samsonov’s shutout effort:
Terrific. It is what you want to see from him. I didn’t think there was a whole lot of offense in the game either way tonight, but certainly, they probably had the better of the chances in the game, I would say. He was excellent.
It was great to see. It is nice to have him out here on the road. He probably learned pretty quickly as a dad that the road is helpful in terms of rest, preparation, and all of these kinds of things with getting a night in the hotel. That is all part of it.
For him to have this response in a game like this against a desperate team on the other side was good.
On William Nylander and Michael Bunting scoring after relatively slow periods of productivity:
It is great for both of those guys. Great goals — Bunts’, in particular. He turns and is ready to shoot.
Will is in a spot, and you could hear him from the bench calling for that pass. Kerfoot finds him, and he makes good on it.
For those two guys to score — and Zohorna — that is what you need. Our top guys didn’t quite get going offensively, but you need contributions like that.
One of the things we have been talking about the most about is managing the lead and not letting teams into it. We took another penalty in the third period that opened the door a little bit for them, but by and large, I really liked how we handled the game once we had the lead.
On shuffling the lines as the game progressed:
At that point, we are leading. It is more about managing the matchups and such. I thought the Stutzle group was really having their way with us there. I wanted to change some things up.
Plus, I came into the game tonight wanting to look at some different things and try some different things, too. I knew coming in that things were going to move around more tonight than they have been of late.
With the way the game was going, it just made sense for me to do that.
On how the Morgan Rielly – Luke Schenn pairing is gelling:
They’re good. They’re still finding their way.
We have gone with McCabe and Brodie for a good chunk of time now, and the same with Gio and Holl, who have played together a lot in the last couple of seasons. Rielly and Schenn is the newest one.
Schenn is kind of sharing shifts with Liljegren, so that is the one that hasn’t had as much time, but I see it coming together. I thought Mo had some really good moments in the game today activating and being involved in the offense. He broke up plays defensively.
Schenn is doing his thing as well, being physical and advancing the puck. To that end, I thought it was good. They played some tough shifts against their top line, which was a real handful for us tonight. You can see it coming together. I like that.
I like how all of the defense has been moving lately.
On balancing the focus on the final games of the regular season against preparing for Tampa in round one:
The preparation, for the most part, goes on behind the scenes.
We played them last season. We are monitoring them through this season. There is not a lot of difference there in terms of what you are going to prepare for. It is more just focusing on our game.
Focusing on our game allows us to continue to prepare for the remaining regular season games at the same time.
