The Maple Leafs are looking to make it five wins in their last six games when they visit Columbus for the second half of a back-to-back (7:30 p.m. EST, TSN4).
Under the previous head coach, the Leafs lost four of their last eight to a bottom-feeding Columbus team, albeit two of the losses came in extra time (both 6-5 OT defeats). The 1-0 regulation loss to Montreal was not a positive start vs. non-playoff-caliber competition, although the process/performance was certainly better than the result. Tonight is an opportunity to start righting the wrongs of recent seasons regarding dropped points to clearly inferior opposition, and they’ll need to do it against a well-rested Columbus side as the tired team that traveled following last night’s convincing 5-2 win over Tampa.
With Joseph Woll close but unready to return tonight, Dennis Hildeby will make his second NHL start, while the lone lineup change among the player group will be David Kampf exiting the lineup as a healthy scratch (Ryan Reaves returns).
Kampf, notably, did not see any time on the PK when the game was still competitive against Tampa last night (just 53 seconds total, all in the third period). He has not appeared on either (successful) 5v3 kill so far this season, against Montreal in the season opener or against Tampa on Monday. He has one point in six games, is a minus-three, has won just 47.2% of his faceoffs, and has seen his ice time drop from over 13 minutes under Sheldon Keefe last season to just over 11 under Craig Berube so far. He is no longer in a shutdown center type of role, centering more of an energy fourth line instead when he’s in the lineup.
At $2.4 million on the cap with two more years remaining on his contract, and with Connor Dewar and Calle Jarnkrok eligible to return from LTIR in four games time, Kampf’s situation is certainly one to watch in the next week or two. There is also the matter of Timothy Liljegren ($3 million AAV, one more year), who won’t play in this back-to-back after Conor Timmins’ strong performance vs. Tampa. Liljegren has played all of 13:55 total so far this season (one game) after averaging 19:40 per night in 2023-24, and he has not entered the lineup for either tired back-to-back situation so far.
Game Day Quotes
Craig Berube on the challenge presented by the Blue Jackets:
They’re a young, very good skating hockey team, so we have to play smart. We have to play our game, as we did last night. We have to be physical, have good structure, and play good defense.
[Dean Evason’s] teams play hard and come at you hard. It is what we see in the tape. They are very aggressive. They are going to come at us and take away time and space. They are playing hard.
Berube on Dennis Hildeby’s readiness for his second NHL start:
He has handled this well since camp. He has great composure. I have seen him work every day and how he prepares himself daily. He is a pretty dialed-in guy. He has done a good job.
Blue Jackets head coach Dean Evason on tinkering with his line combinations ahead of tonight’s game:
We are trying to shift around. We didn’t have a very productive night offensively the other night (vs. Minnesota). We thought we did some real good things defensively. We gave up the 5-on-3 to make it 2-1, but we thought we limited them pretty well.
We are looking after our defensive zone, but we have to try to find some way to score some goals. We are moving some stuff around to get some balance, and hopefully, we can generate some more offense because of it.
Toronto Maple Leafs Projected Lines
Forwards
#23 Matthew Knies — #34 Auston Matthews — #16 Mitch Marner
#74 Bobby McMann — #11 Max Domi — #88 William Nylander
#67 Max Pacioretty — #91 John Tavares — #89 Nick Robertson
#18 Steven Lorentz — #29 Pontus Holmberg — #75 Ryan Reaves
Defensemen
#44 Morgan Rielly — #8 Chris Tanev
#95 Oliver Ekman-Larsson — #22 Jake McCabe
#2 Simon Benoit — #25 Conor Timmins
Goaltenders
#35 Dennis Hildeby
#41 Anthony Stolarz
Extras: Philippe Myers, Timothy Liljegren, David Kampf
Injured (IR): Joseph Woll
Injured (LTIR): Calle Jarnkrok, Jani Hakanpaa, Connor Dewar, Dakota Mermis
Columbus Blue Jackets Projected Lines
Forwards
#4 Cole Sillinger — #23 Sean Monahan — #86 Kirill Marchenko
#59 Yegor Chinakhov — #19 Adam Fantilli — #82 Mikael Pythia
#27 Zach Aston-Reese — #17 Justin Danforth — #24 Mathieu Olivier
#21 James van Riemsdyk — #7 Sean Kuraly — #62 Kevin Labanc
Defensemen
#8 Zach Werenski — #9 Ivan Provorov
#23 Jake Christiansen — #78 Damon Severson
#3 Jack Johnson — #55 David Jiricek
Goaltenders
#40 Daniil Tarasov
#90 Elvis Merzlikins
