We’ll leave the game preview to Jake McCabe: “We let Chief down a little bit in that first game [vs. St. Louis] in Toronto… He is not one to make a big deal out of it, but we want to put a good effort forth tonight.” (7:00 p.m. EST, Sportsnet/CBC).
Game Day Quotes
Craig Berube on what the team learned from the game tape of the Leafs‘ 5-1 loss to St. Louis on Oct. 24:
We do use footage of what we didn’t accomplish in the game. We had 43 shots on the net in that game. Out of those 43 shots, there weren’t a lot of second and third opportunities. We missed some opportunities — open nets and things like that — where the execution was off a little bit.
We just weren’t hard enough. We didn’t play a hard enough game, in my opinion, and the goals they scored, we gave them. We were a little loose in some situations.
Berube on his memories of living in St. Louis:
Great sports town. They really like their teams, whether it is the Cardinals or Blues. They are very passionate about their sports. They are also very friendly people. I got to know a lot of people here and made a lot of great friends. The people are great here.
Berube on the need to improve team discipline and reduce penalties:
For me, it is understanding situations. If you are in the offensive zone, there is no reason to take a penalty there. You are 200 feet from your net. When you take a penalty, it should be desperation around your net saving a goal with some sort of desperate play.
At times, we are just careless with our sticks. We have to be more disciplined with it. That is the biggest thing. You are going to take penalties in a game for whatever reason — I get — but when you are using the stick, the guy takes the puck in the offensive zone, and you want to give him a tug, that is a penalty where you have to be disciplined. It is a mindset. Move your feet. Get your stick on the ice.
Jake McCabe on whether there is extra motivation knowing it’s Berube’s return to St. Louis:
Absolutely. We let Chief down a little bit in that first game in Toronto. He is not one to make a big deal out of it, but we want to put a good effort forth tonight, stay out of penalty trouble, and keep this momentum going from the last couple of games.
McCabe on the recent loss to the Blues and how it feeds the pre-scout ahead of tonight’s rematch:
We played them recently, and we didn’t love our game against them. We are looking to have a good start and go from there.
Any time you can go through your pre-scout video and you are not only watching how you played against them but how your systems looked, it always helps in that aspect.
Looking forward to getting a good start out of our group tonight. We need to be aggressive and get on the forecheck.
McCabe on the early success of his pairing with Chris Tanev:
We’ve played a lot on the penalty kill together, so there are a lot of similarities in that sense. I think we are similar in how we like to go about our games, use our feet, and use our checking ability when closing in the defensive zone and breaking out cleanly. It has been going well so far. We talk a lot out there. [Tanev] is an ultimate pro and super easy to play with.
St. Louis head coach Drew Bannister on his team’s recent 2-1 loss to Flyers, extending the Blues’ losing streak to three games:
I thought we did a lot of good things on both sides of the puck, but right now, our mistakes are amplified. We just have to clean up the minimal mistakes we made. If we play that way and clean up mistakes, we will win more hockey games than we lose.
I think we played well but I still think we can do more. As a team, when things aren’t going well, you have to be able to change things up – you have to change things on the fly, but you have to re-adjust after games to give yourself the best chance to win. It’s important when guys play well that we give them an opportunity, and if some guys aren’t playing well, then they might move down the lineup at times.
Toronto Maple Leafs Projected Lines
Forwards
#23 Matthew Knies — #34 Auston Matthews — #16 Mitch Marner
#67 Max Pacioretty — #91 John Tavares — #88 William Nylander
#74 Bobby McMann — #11 Max Domi — #29 Pontus Holmberg
#18 Steven Lorentz — #64 David Kampf — #75 Ryan Reaves
Defensemen
#44 Morgan Rielly — #95 Oliver Ekman-Larsson
#22 Jake McCabe — #8 Chris Tanev
#2 Simon Benoit — #25 Conor Timmins
Goaltenders
Starter: #60 Joseph Woll
#41 Anthony Stolarz
Extras: Philippe Myers, Nick Robertson, Matt Benning
Injured (LTIR): Calle Jarnkrok, Jani Hakanpaa, Connor Dewar, Dakota Mermis
St. Louis Blues Projected Lines
Forwards
#20 Brandon Saad — #89 Pavel Buchnevich — #63 Jake Neighbours
#81 Dylan Holloway — #10 Brayden Schenn — #25 Jordan Kyrou
#13 Alexey Toropchenko — #12 Radek Faksa — #76 Zack Bolduc
#9 Alexandre Texier — #70 Oskar Sundqvist— #26 Nathan Walker
Defensemen
#22 Ryan Suter — #55 Colton Parayko
#6 Philip Broberg — #72 Justin Faulk
#77 Pierre-Oliver Joseph — #51 Matthew Kessel
Goaltenders
Starter: #50 Jordan Binnington
#30 Joel Hofer
Injured: Torey Krug, Robert Thomas, Nick Leddy, Mathieu Joseph, Kasperi Kapanen
