The high of the Marchenko trade –> the Marchenko-Matthews line flying out of the gates from the opening puck drop –> William Nylander following up in their wake, walking Nick Suzuki, and ripping it past Jakub Dobes in the first minute of this game is something Leafs fans will want captured in a vial and permanently hooked up to their veins.
But reality was bound to hit, and hit it did.
This Leafs team has 10+ new faces, a new coaching staff, played just two preseason games together, and then had two roster players moved out on the eve of the season in exchange for a new top-line player. They were playing a Conference Finalist club from last season that returned nearly its full roster. This result shouldn’t be over-analyzed in that sense; once the early adrenaline wore off, the Habs’ familiarity, established chemistry, and well-drilled structure shone through, and the Leafs struggled to consistently create enough high-danger looks over the 60 minutes, while their 0-for-4 power play — which, again, had its top unit shaken up significantly just yesterday with the Marchenko trade (more on that below) — wasn’t on the same page yet. Jake McCabe missing most of a period and finishing with just under 12 minutes of ice time, throwing the pairings into a blender for a while, also didn’t help.
It also shouldn’t be overlooked that Jakub Dobes was excellent in this game, and this is a different game if Matthews or Marchenko buries at least one of those grade-A looks in the early first and second, respectively.
That said, the defensive concerns with a combination of a Rielly-Raddysh pairing, plus the McKenna-Tavares-Nylander line, probably aren’t going anywhere (as a five-man unit, they were on for two goals against). The challenge of navigating McKenna’s NHL acclimation in terms of his usage and lineup placement probably isn’t going anywhere, either. And the task of finding the right bottom-six combinations probably isn’t going to be fixed with a few more reps for the existing lines.
It’s not like the Leafs played wide-open, structure-less, unserious, firewagon-style hockey in this opening game, as they’ve been guilty of early on in past seasons. They actually didn’t give up all that much off the rush; the struggles came with some sloppy puck play in their own end leading to some zone time and dirty goals around the net for the Habs. Even on the Zach Bolduc goal that came off the coverage breakdown in the middle of the slot, OEL handed a puck right over twice, leading to the defensive-zone draw in the first place, which the Leafs then won, only for Rielly to throw the puck away for no real reason.
Let’s see if they can clean it up tomorrow.
Post-Game Notes
- Darren Raddysh’s night actually started off pretty well — he pinched down to help create the Nylander goal, he made a few clean touches on breakouts, and he fired a shot into a good area for a dangerous tip play by John Tavares. But it did badly unravel from there, clearly, as he became a Pez dispenser for a solid chunk of the game, and one of those turnovers led to the 1-1 goal. The NHL’s official game stats credited him with five giveaways in 23:47 of ice time.
- The broader concern with this pairing is not so much that Raddysh will turn pucks over as frequently as he did in this game — he won’t — but more about the fact that both he and Rielly see green lights all the time, and are, to be fair, at their most effective when they’re aggressive that way — activating into the rush on breakouts, pinching down/diving in on pucks in the offensive zone, etc. We saw the risk on display halfway through the second when they were quite lucky not to give up a totally free-and-clear breakaway to Cole Caufield. Raddysh is very active; he also just got paid $8.5 million to be a major offensive factor, and Rielly will not be his best self when he has to be the responsible one on a pairing. It made some sense to start this way and see, given the McCabe-Tanev connection, and they shouldn’t be written off after one game, but their debut didn’t assuage any of the concerns.
- Kirill Marchenko certainly is a thrill to watch, and he was also quite effective in this game, for the most part (one assist, four shots on goal, team-leading five individual scoring chances in 20:08). Auston Matthews hasn’t been beating defenders 1v1 with his speed and skill as much as he once did in the league (that was true again tonight), and Marchenko’s ability to push the pace for the line and take on/beat defenders is a force multiplier that drives all kinds of opportunities for himself and his linemates. Jack Roslovic also had a nice debut on the other wing, including setting up two point-blank one-timer looks for Matthews and Marchenko. At least one of those really should’ve gone in, and it would’ve been a different hockey game.
- The top line controlled eight of the nine scoring chances at five-on-five (11-3 in shots, 14-7 shot attempts). Shots were 8-1 for the Leafs in the head-to-head matchup against the Suzuki line. You’ll certainly take that, and on most nights, they would’ve scored at least one with this quality of performance.
- Natural Stat Trick credited the Leafs with six high-danger chances in the ~15 minutes with Matthews and Marchenko on the ice at five-on-five. They recorded three in all of their other ~31 five-on-five minutes. It was mostly Nylander otherwise, with a few dangerous opportunities in tight for Tavares.
- The only real blemish on Marchenko’s game was when he forced a give-and-go pass back to Matthews instead of quickly getting it off his stick with a lot of net to shoot at. There is naturally a little bit of giddiness when two players of their talent level get together for the first time, as you could see in their interactions on the bench.
- Marchenko was also finding his bearings on the power play, naturally, and that wasn’t his fault. It would’ve been fine to just ask Marchenko to play some PP2 or skip the PP assignment altogether tonight so the team could roll the units that have actually been practicing and playing together. I thought that was a bit of a bizarre call, to be honest. Marchenko can certainly be a weapon on the one-time side or in the bumper, but it’s not like he has been a noted PP specialist throughout his career who simply had to jump straight onto PP1 or else the Leafs coaching staff would be committing malpractice.
- Cowan and Nylander almost always spark chemistry together, so it was no surprise to see them find each other again on the late 3-2 goal. Cowan-Tavares-Nylander would be the obvious choice if tomorrow’s game was a must-win, but they’re obviously — as they should be — trying to give McKenna the proper time to acclimate. The big question was never whether the first real NHL game would be an eye-opener for McKenna, as it clearly was at times in this game; it was how quickly he’ll adjust now.
- Rotating the two kids situationally in the game makes sense, but big picture, the play will likely need to be moving Colton Sissons down a line, Zack MacEwen (5:25, zero credited hits) out of the lineup, and then inserting a Bo Groulx on L3 just to see if they can set it up in such a way that whether McKenna or Cowan is on L3, they have enough to work with there offensively.
- I liked the flashes of what a Teddy Blueger-Brandon Duhaime duo can bring on the penalty kill (which went 2-for-2) and with the right third linemate at five-on-five, but the Leafs need to get serious quickly about sorting their bottom six properly.
- You simply have to respect how, amid all the talk about the Marchenkos and McKennas and Matthews’ skating speeds of late, Nylander (both goals, team-leading five shots) just walked out for the start of the season and reminded everyone who has led the currently active Leafs in points for the last three seasons.
- It was hard to tell from the replay if the third one glanced off Raddysh and changed directions, but the other two Hab goals weren’t on Sergei Bobrovsky. Solid enough debut, though, as he gave the team a chance to win.
Game Flow: 5v5 Shot Attempts
Heat Map: 5v5 Shot Attempts
