Ahead of Thursday’s game in San Jose, head coach Craig Berube discussed the areas for improvement in the final 11 games of the regular season, Max Pacioretty’s availability for the playoffs, and the challenge against the Sharks.
Morning Skate Lines – Mar. 27
#Leafs lines at morning skate Mar. 27/25
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McMann-Tavares-Nylander
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Stolarz@BodogCA— David Alter (@dalter) March 27, 2025
With 11 games to go, what is the biggest area you want to dial in with the team?
Berube: Consistency with our game night in and night out, playing solid hockey to our identity, making sure we are checking and doing things the right way. It’s consistency.
What can you learn about your team during this final stretch, or do you pretty much have a handle on it ahead of the playoffs?
Berube: I don’t know if you ever have a (full) handle on it. Game-to-game, there are always things you want to do better. That’s coaching. You are not satisfied with your game. You are always trying to improve it.
Going down the stretch, it is something we have to keep banging away at it. You are always tinkering with lines and different things with that, but there are also certain areas of the game you are trying to improve.
Special teams need to be good. The power play is going well, and the PK has been better, but we have to keep banging away at the PK because that will be crucial.
What areas of improvement do you want to see on the PK specifically?
Berube: There are little things. For example, if you look at faceoffs, when you win a draw, it’s the clears getting it down the ice and the clears breaking a puck up in the d-zone. It’s also about sticking with the structure.
You always make little tweaks depending on what the power play is doing, but it is simple things like blocking shots around our net and being good around our net on the PK. Those are very important aspects down the stretch.
How much have you been emphasizing the rest element with all of the road games and three-in-fours to preserve everybody?
Berube: We just flew out yesterday, and we had no practice after the game. We got on an early flight and came out here early in order to get acclimated a little bit and get outside. It was a 5 hour and 40 minute flight — a long flight — and then we have to play today, so we decided to do that.
It is important to manage the rest here and know where guys are at. You have to communicate with your players and leaders on that, too, regarding where they are at and how they are feeling. You also have to make sure you get some practice time in, too, to stay sharp.
How confident are you that Max Pacioretty can play for the team in the playoffs?
Berube: Haha, pretty confident. Pretty confident, yeah.
What did you learn about the Sharks from the shootout loss in Toronto?
Berube: They have a lot of skill, and their power play is clicking. It has been really good in the last 10 games. I think it is clicking around a 28% clip. Celebrini is a really good player, and so is the Smith kid. They have some talented guys who can skate and make plays. You can’t come in here and take anyone lightly, including this team.
We have to check well. We have to be on our toes. We have to be good and solid defensively and manage the hockey puck. Sometimes, you tend to get a little loose coming in here or other buildings where the teams aren’t in the playoffs. You try to do too much with the puck, and you end up turning it over in bad areas and not playing to the identity of the team. The key tonight is playing to our identity.
How much do you lean into the fact that the Sharks went into your building and picked up a win?
Berube: If we go back to that game, we were up 2-0. We scored two power-play goals. We didn’t generate a ton at five-on-five against them. We were a little bit gassed, but they came back in that game and ended up winning it in the shootout.
This team is not going to give up. They play with a lot of juice. They are excited. Even though they know where they are at in the standings, they have good young players coming and a new identity. They are feeling good. They’re playing, and they’re going to play us hard tonight.
Against a young team you only see twice a year, it can be unpredictable. Does that make it more difficult to gameplan?
Berube: It does. That is why we have to focus on our game and what we do best as a team. We have to focus on that. There are things that the Sharks do in certain situations, but it is about us tonight. It is about us putting our foot on the gas from the get-go and playing our game.
