The Maple Leafs look to start turning their underwhelming road record around in their annual visit to the Lone Star State tonight in Dallas (7:30 p.m. EST, Sportsnet).
This will be an interesting game to evaluate from the Toronto perspective.
With the return of David Kampf, the team is now fully healthy among its player group (Calle Jarnkrok never factored in at any point this season and may not again). The bottom six has all its personnel back (but is apparently sitting one of its best 12, Connor Dewar, for Ryan Reaves). There is an experimental top six in place, with the Nylander – Matthews – Marner / Knies – Tavares – Pacioretty lines. The team has also struggled on the road this season — particularly on the power play (14.7%) — with a 5-6-2 record away from home.
The Leafs have faced a run of mostly weaker opponents and played well enough for parts of those games to pick up enough results to keep them first in the Atlantic Division, but the 60-minute efforts and quality of their five-on-five play haven’t been totally convincing along the way. Now, they play a 2024 conference finalist Stars team with a record very similar to the Leafs‘ through 30 games (19-11-0), a top 10 team in all the major metrics indicating control over the five-on-five play.
The Stars are without Tyler Seguin (who was off to a great start with 20 points in 19 games) and Matt Dumba (you can decide if that’s a positive or a negative for Toronto). They’re also battling a flu bug in the room, which has led to several game-time decisions. Still, assuming Thomas Harley — who missed Monday’s game — has recovered and the Stars aren’t without too many bodies due to the flu, the teams are close enough to full strength to take some meaning out of the game, at least as far as game #32 of an NHL regular season goes.
Game Day Quotes
Pete DeBoer on the differences in the pre-scout of the Leafs under Craig Berube:
They definitely look different. You can see his fingerprints on the team and what they are trying to do.
At the same time, they still have that game-breaking ability when you look at the roster, especially with Matthews back in now. You can say they are playing more direct. They are more of an O-zone possession team. They are getting to the slot more.
All of the analytics point to a harder, heavier team in those areas of the ice — defensively, too. But you are not going to take away the game-breaking ability of the guys they have there who are special. If you give those guys room or free offense, they are going to take advantage of it.
Dangerous team.
DeBoer on Chris Tanev’s impact in Dallas last season:
When I talk about our run (in the second half), he was a big piece of that. He really solidified our defensive group. He played big, hard, heavy minutes for us against all of the league’s top players.
If you look at our playoff path last year, we had Eichel and Vegas in the first round. We had MacKinnon and Colorado in the second round. We had McDavid and Edmonton in the third round. He was playing against all of those guys every night.
He was a big part of what we did here last year.
DeBoer on whether the Leafs are a special matchup for him and his Ontario-born players:
It is special for the Ontario guys and Canadians in general. We all grew up on Hockey Night in Canada. We all know the importance of hockey in Canada if you grow up there.
Playing the Leafs is always special if you are a Canadian kid.
Craig Berube on the challenge presented by the Stars:
They have some really good skill over there and good players, but they have been a good team for quite some time now. This is going back years that they have had this core.
They play a good brand of hockey. They don’t give up a lot defensively, and they play a fast game. Their special teams are good. It is a hard team and a good team.
Berube on Pete DeBoer-coached teams:
He is a great coach and has done really well everywhere he has gone.
His teams all play the same way. I remember New Jersey, when he got here, started their swarm defense. His neutral zone was different back then — it was a 1-1-3 more than it is now; it is a 1-2-2 now. But that swarm defense with both a D and a forward in there outnumbering you right away has been a signature for a long time with him.
His teams all play fast. They move the puck quickly and play north hockey.
Berube on his message to the Nylander-Matthews-Marner line:
I thought they were pretty good together and created some opportunities. For me, with those guys all being together, it’s, “Don’t be too fancy.” You still have to play the right way, be direct, shoot pucks, and get to the net.
I talked to the guys. You can’t all be on the outside wanting the puck trying to create space for yourself. You have to be direct still, and you have to have guys at the net still. If someone has the puck, the other two guys have to read off of each other and be at the net.
If they have the puck and are skating with the puck doing all this stuff, but no one is at the net and no shots are getting there, it is pretty much useless.
Head-to-Head Stats: Maple Leafs (19-10-2) vs. Stars (19-11-0)
In the 2024-25 regular season statistics, Dallas holds the advantage in five out of five offensive categories, but Toronto holds the advantage in four out of five defensive categories.
Toronto Maple Leafs Projected Lines
Forwards
#88 William Nylander — #34 Auston Matthews — #16 Mitch Marner
#23 Matthew Knies— #91 John Tavares — #67 Max Pacioretty
#74 Bobby McMann — #11 Max Domi — #89 Nick Robertson
#18 Steven Lorentz — #64 David Kampf — #75 Ryan Reaves
Defensemen
#22 Jake McCabe — #8 Chris Tanev
#44 Morgan Rielly — #95 Oliver Ekman-Larsson
#2 Simon Benoit — #25 Conor Timmins
Goaltenders
Starter: #60 Joseph Woll
#35 Dennis Hildeby
Extras: Pontus Holmberg, Connor Dewar, Philippe Myers
Injured (IR): Jani Hakanpää, Anthony Stolarz
Injured (LTIR): Calle Jarnkrok
Dallas Stars Projected Lines
Forwards
#21 Jason Robertson — #24 Roope Hintz — #22 Mavrik Bourque
#27 Mason Marchment — #95 Matt Duchene — #11 Logan Stankoven
#14 Jamie Benn — #53 Wyatt Johnston — #53 Evgenii Dadonov
#10 Oskar Back — #18 Sam Steel — #15 Colin Blackwell
Defensemen
#23 Esa Lindell — #4 Miro Heiskanen
#6 Lian Bischel — #46 Ilya Lyubushkin
#2 Brendan Smith — #28 Alex Petrovic
Goaltenders
Starter: #29 Jake Oettinger
#33 Magnus Hellberg
Injured/Out: Tyler Seguin, Matt Dumba, Casey DeSmith, Thomas Harley
