Quietly, the San Jose Sharks were 4-0-0 against the Maple Leafs in the Macklin Celebrini era despite missing the playoffs in both seasons.
Inside those games, Matthews and Celebrini went head-to-head three times (Matthews missed one of the games due to injury), and Celebrini decidedly won those minutes in the run of play.
Tonight, it was a compliment to Easton Cowan’s start to the season that he was moved up next to Matthews and Jack Roslovic inside that matchup. It ended as a saw-off, with more-or-less even underlying numbers. Matthews committed the turnover on the one Sharks goal coming off a penalty kill (away from the Celebrini matchup), but then he took care of business on the power play, burying one and assisting on the other, before helping close the game out at 5v6 with an assist on Nick Paul’s empty-netter. It was good to see, and another sign Matthews is much closer to himself again, as Celebrini moving to 5-0 vs. the Leafs while winning those head-to-head minutes decisively again would’ve been unconscionable.
Instead, we left the game with Matthews all over the scoresheet, Celebrini not on it, Gavin McKenna on the scoresheet, Ivar Stenberg not on it, Sergei Bobrovsky’s first home win, and the Leafs’ three-game losing slide snapped. Even if it wasn’t a totally convincing performance all the way through, you’ll certainly take that if you’re the Maple Leafs/their fans.
It was also great to see a Leaf goaltender hold a team to less than three for just the second time in 10 games. Bobrovsky stopped 30 of 31 and 2.81 goals above expected in easily his best home start as a Leaf.
This was a bit of a weird game to break down. It was pretty close at five-on-five overall, and the special teams decided it. Yet the defensive play on display was not that of a typical 2-1 (plus an EN) hockey game, as both goalies needed to be quite good. The Leafs’ finishing in the second period, in particular —their decisions on the final pass (Willy’s pass on the 2v1 with Matthews??), and the quality of their finishing attempts on their best looks — was at times lacking and at times unlucky, until Matthews buried one late in the period on a great setup by Kirill Marchenko.
While the post-game narratives, given the result, will likely gravitate to “The Leafs finally shut a game down with the lead!,” the Sharks easily could’ve scored a few more than they did, too. Written only semi-sarcastically, the Leafs’ 4v5 play might be better than their 5v5 play right now when leading. When the Leafs took the lead on Gavin McKenna’s (game-winning) third-period power play goal, they responded by instantly giving up two grade-As. Immediately after the center-ice faceoff following the McKenna goal, OEL turned a puck over leading to a point-blank Celebrini look that rattled the crossbar.
Off the ensuing offensive-zone faceoff, Darren Raddysh turned one over up the wall, leading to a near backdoor tap-in play that Celebrini just missed on (to the point earlier — both of those Celebrini chances came away from Matthews, who had just stepped off after the McKenna PP goal). It was certainly better than the disaster against Buffalo, but there is still plenty to clean up here. You’ll often need to bend but not break to some degree with a third-period lead in the NHL, but those are the types of looks you simply can’t give up seconds after taking the lead, and both came off avoidable turnovers by the D.
As stated, this game, in the end, was decided on special teams, where the Leafs came out ahead 2-0 in a game with nine power plays (five for the Leafs, four for the Sharks). Their ample talent on the PP is shining through; when their attempts to feed Darren Raddysh up top for some shots all led to easy saves with no traffic, they found a way through by working it down low, through Marchenko’s great feed to Matthews on a nice pop-play one-timer and then McKenna’s poised finish in the third. The veteran role players they added over the summer, who are highly experienced in and fully committed to their roles on the PK (Sissons, Blueger, Duhaime, Paul), are also shining through. The combination is best-in-the-league special teams through 10 games. The five-on-five play… still a work in progress.
Post-Game Notes
- Most on the outside probably would’ve gone with Anthony Stolarz in this start after Saturday, but Bobrovsky put that debate to bed. The decision to leave Bobrovsky in Toronto now — instead of traveling to Columbus — is smart and probably an Andy O’Brien wrinkle. It’s a really busy schedule to end the month — seven in 11 — so giving Bobrovsky basically an off day, where he stays within his routine at home and is ready to go for later this week, is a sensible approach.
- After Kirill Marchenko finished 10th among Leafs forwards in five-on-five ice time in the low-scoring loss to the Islanders, he finished tied for ninth among forwards with 18 shifts (but did make it to 17:21 overall with the ample power-play time). They need to find a few more shifts for him somewhere because he has easily been one of their best, most consistently dangerous forwards since late in the Utah game.
- Linemate Nick Paul finished at nearly 19 minutes and was quite effective overall, both at the PK and at five-on-five, including getting into a skirmish with Kieffer Sherwood late in the third after a good 2v2 sequence with Nylander, followed by good defensive work at 5v6, including scoring the empty-netter. The line with Paul, Nylander, and Marchenko was easily the team’s most dangerous at five-on-five, as they really took it to the Stenberg-Misa-Sherwood line, in particular, in the run of play and the scoring chances; they should’ve potted a few at five-on-five. There has been lots of chatter online about Dennis Hildeby’s stats in two total starts for the Lightning, but I shudder at the thought of the Leafs’ situation down the middle with John Tavares currently out and Paul not here.
- The Leafs’ fourth liners have now gone 10 games without a point, but that’s definitely not their whole story over the last three games. They’ve drawn a couple of penalties — Duhaime drew the deciding penalty tonight in the third — and generated momentum by grinding pucks in the offensive zone. The Leafs as a team haven’t won the five-on-five shot-attempt share since the win over Nashville six games ago, but the Duhaime-Blueger-MacEwen line, over the last three, is winning its minutes across shot attempts, shots, and scoring chances, and it has drawn two penalties in the offensive zone. They’re not eating tons of d-zone draws or taking on difficult matchups — nor are they built to with MacEwen there — but they’re tasked with providing energy and momentum, and they’ve done that job since the Leafs returned home.
- Vinni Lettieri played just 9:20 in his Leafs debut, but he was generally sound with the puck, actually led all Leaf forwards with three hits, and you could see it doesn’t take much of an opening for him to get a shot on and off his stick that is a legitimate tool at any level. Midway through the second, he nearly got a quick one-timer through Askarov on a good feed by Gavin McKenna.
- Oliver Ekman-Larsson played just 14:42 tonight, the second time he’s been below 15 minutes in the last five games (and third time below 16). He took his team-leading seventh penalty (minus-five penalty differential), turned a puck over leading to a Celebrini crossbar after the Leafs took the 2-1 lead, and then at one point missed a simple D-to-D pass by a shockingly wide margin. If you told anyone Chris Tanev would be out of the lineup again after only a handful of games, you’d instantly assume OEL would be taking on a prominent role, but it’s largely Raddysh taking on huge minutes (nearly 27 tonight) and the likes of Troy Stecher stepping up. They need OEL to find his game soon because it’s putting too much on the plate of defensemen who are clearly overextended workload-wise, even if they’re sort of getting by okay for now. The unit isn’t nearly talented enough to lose Tanev and then deploy OEL like he’s a bottom-pairing defenseman they need to hide.
- Thought this was the PK’s best night amid a 10-game segment with a lot of good nights on the PK. By the big third-period kill, they weren’t just keeping it to the outside and the seams sealed; they were disrupting entries and actively threatening the other way. You can tell they’re really feeling it now. The wrinkle of mixing in Cowan and Nylander late in kills (~20 seconds left or less) has been clever and effective; Nylander has nearly scored twice now shorthanded late in kills, and the way they’ve done it situationally has limited any of the risk.
Game Flow: 5v5 Shot Attempts
Heat Map: 5v5 Shot Attempts
