Anthony Petrielli joined Sportsnet 590 to discuss Easton Cowan’s strong start, potential tweaks to the Leafs’ forward lines, the early chemistry between Auston Matthews and Kirill Marchenko, and the situation on the blue line.
Petrielli on Easton Cowan’s strong start to the season:
I’m not surprised at all. Everyone would be forgiven for not watching them down the stretch last year, but Cowan was pretty much the best thing about them down the stretch last season. He looked really good. He played a ton with William Nylander and John Tavares.
Dating back to last season, he’s around 12 points in the last 14 games — not a crazy stretch of time, obviously. In between that, he’s gone and won the AHL championship. Other than Akhtyamov, he was clearly the best player, as you would expect. He was productive down the stretch, and he decided to toss in an AHL championship in between, and he’s now hit the ground running.
The reality is that, if they didn’t win the lottery and keep their pick, Easton Cowan would have had a ton of attention heading into the season, just like last season. But then, obviously, they did win the lottery. You throw in a couple of blockbuster moves, and he kind of gets lost in the conversation, which is good for him.
He’s kind of falling under the radar, not necessarily because of anything he’s done. For a young kid in this market, I don’t think it’s a bad thing to fall under the radar at times and then come and put himself back on it with his play.
This presents a good problem for them. You can see why they have everyone that’s in the top six currently in the top six, and then you have Cowan, who’s on the third line. Again, it’s a good problem for them to sort through. They have some options. It’s about how they manage it.
It was kind of stunning to me that he only played 13:22 in that game against the Islanders. It felt like he was on the ice and all over it all the time. You could have convinced me he played 17, 18 minutes without looking. He played every special teams unit. His line was really good.
If he keeps this up, they have to give him more minutes.
Petrielli on when Jim Hiller should consider changing the forward lines, if the McKenna-Tavares-Nylander line’s problems persist:
Well, they start on a four-game homestand, and then they head out to the Vegas–Colorado trip, right? Probably basically before heading on the road.
The line wasn’t good against the Islanders, and that Islanders team was not particularly good. The Tavares line was out-attempted 19–3 in that game at home. Pretty ridiculous numbers.
Look, if they’re going to do that two more games, and then you’re going to head to the Vegases, Colorados, Utahs of the world, I wouldn’t throw them to the wolves like that. Those are top teams. Those are all playoff teams and teams that consider themselves contenders.
It’s one thing when you’re at home. You can control the matchup a lot better. It’s not even necessarily about, “Well, you just got four games, and it is what it is.” It’s kind of, “You get four games in your controlled state before we go off to the road.”
But if you’re going to keep doing this, you can’t possibly just throw them out there against those teams and expect to have even a remotely successful road trip. At some point, it’s just too detrimental to the overall group and to that line.
It’s not to say the clock is ticking. It’s not to make an immediate decision. But they definitely can’t keep looking like they have, and you can’t just keep throwing it over the boards.
You can’t go into Colorado and say, “Well, we’ve done this for four games now, but let’s just see how it happens in Colorado.”
Petrielli on potential changes to the second and third lines:
They’re in an interesting spot that way because, as we’ve said, they obviously want to give things time, and you can’t blame them for that. I don’t think anyone will sit there, if they have the exact same lines tomorrow, and say, “I can’t believe he’s running them a third straight game.” That’s fairly reasonable for him to do that.
At the same time, the top line hasn’t just scored; they’ve been really good. They’ve dominated play. When Matthews and Marchenko are hopping the boards, the puck is immediately tilting to the other side of the ice.
They obviously haven’t played together. They just met each other this week, so you can kind of see it in what they’re doing. But you can see how they’re moving off each other, and you can see how talkative they are on the bench.
I don’t think anyone should be worried about them eventually bursting through and eventually just going on a run where they probably both get pretty hot at some point in the season and do quite a bit of damage.
And then the third line looks good. They were arguably their best line against the Islanders. They started that game and played against the Bo Horvat line primarily, which frees up the other two lines a little bit, which is something that has been discussed pretty much since the Berube era ended and during it as well.
I think the easiest thing you could possibly do is just flip Nylander and Sissons. Nylander plays with Paul and Cowan because I think Cowan and Nylander genuinely have some built-in chemistry. We saw it all throughout last season, whenever they played together, and obviously they scored a nice goal against Montreal.
Paul looks good so far. I thought his first period was a bit shaky against Montreal. Him staring into the corner as Josh Anderson is whacking a puck home is not my favourite moment of the year, for sure. But since then, he’s been really good, and he’s moving well. He made a nice play to set up Sissons’ goal. If Paul was centering him, Nylander’s played with a lot worse and still done pretty well.
I do think Tavares and McKenna make sense as a combo — playmaker, shooter, Tavares’ experience. I’m not expecting Sissons to provide a ton to them, but he’ll forecheck, he’ll help them out defensively, and you get the right shot still. Looking at it in the past couple of days, I thought that’s probably the path-of-least-resistance type move that still makes sense and kind of balances it out.
Again, they kind of get into that tough spot where it’s like, “Well, if you want the Paul line to go up against the Bo Horvat line, are you still going to do that with Nylander there? And then what does that mean for the Matthews line?”
That’s the domino effect that they’re probably trying to balance right now. It’s just a bit of a tricky spot. There’s nothing that they’re going to do that you’re going to say, “This is 100% the right thing to do on paper.”
Petrielli on the early fit between Auston Matthews and Kirill Marchenko:
I’s funny because the other easiest thing they could do is just flip Nylander and Marchenko. Marchenko might even be a bit more of a line driver than Nylander. But Matthews and Marchenko look so good that you just kind of want to keep that rolling. You want to protect the integrity of the top of your lineup.
It’s not like Colorado sits there and says, “Well, MacKinnon and Necas are really tearing it up, but the other lines aren’t doing that well, so we should split them.” Top teams generally play their top winger with their top center.
You can argue whether it is Marchenko or Nylander, but I do think Marchenko is probably better at just driving a line across 200 feet of hockey, whereas, objectively, Nylander’s been more offensively productive.
Every time that top line is on the ice, they’re in the offensive zone. They’re making plays. To me, they’ve done everything you could possibly hope other than score.
It’s funny to say because eventually you will need them to actually score. But considering they’re brand new and didn’t get to practice together… How many hours of sleep did Marchenko have between both games combined? Probably not much, right? I’m sure it’s a whirlwind for him as well.
Considering he needs to just settle in and practice with the team and kind of understand what they’re doing, especially on the power play — where I don’t think any of them know what they’re doing right now — it’s been a very, very encouraging start.
Again, it’s to the point where you’re like, “Let’s not break this up. We have something coming here.” They just need to kind of put the puck in the back of the net, loosen up, and feel better about themselves that way–especially Matthews.
Matthews is skating well, and we know Marchenko is a blazer. It’s nice to have these 6-foot-3, big, talented, fast guys hopping the boards and completely tilting it whenever they’re on the ice.
Petrielli on the Leafs’ defense, its age and speed, and the need to add another piece:
This is just purely subjective, but there were a few times where they panned to John Chayka during the game, and in reading his eyes, I thought, “He’s thinking about the defense.” I mean, everyone is, right? The reality is they definitely need some help.
You were hoping that Emil Andrae could at least be a piece of that as younger, fresher legs. He was actually pretty decent for Columbus in his debut there and set up Knies’ goal. But you were kind of hoping he would be a bit of younger, fresher legs. He was slated to be the youngest defenseman on the team.
Beyond him, in the youth department of the organization, it’s hopefully Ben Danford at some point. But he needs time, and then the Marlies have a ton of veterans themselves. Whether it’s Dakota Mermis or Philippe Myers, or kind of go down the list, there’s also quite a few older guys there as well.
Ideally, they’re bringing in someone younger and on the ascension who could potentially work their way into some form of top-four role. But it’s a hard trade to conceive given all the draft picks that they’ve traded already. The players that might be able to help you get something are players you don’t really want to trade, or you kind of get to the point of you’re robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Do you want to trade Easton Cowan to potentially bring in a defenseman? In theory, yes, you would trade a winger to add a defenseman, obviously. But how much better is that making the bottom line of your team right away?
Teams probably aren’t trading a better defenseman for a winger who’s slightly worse. They’re in a bit of a pickle in that way.
You’re hoping, more than anything, that Tanev stays healthy because he makes a huge difference. It is very nice having Chris Tanev back, as everyone would have expected. He’s still really good, clearly. That’s not even in question. It’s whether he can stay healthy or how long he can stay healthy.
And Raddysh helps. You could see the difference between the first game and the second game. The bar to clear was not very high, but he did it. You would hope, eventually, that he kind of settles in and relaxes.
The team looks a little disjointed in general, and everyone understands why. These guys are brand new. You’re throwing strangers on the ice together, especially the first game.
It’s going to take defensemen, in particular, time because they’re looking up and thinking, “No one’s where I expect them to be.” The breakouts aren’t crisp, and there are a ton of new linemates all over the ice.
Look at the top six: a brand-new player who just got here, and an 18-year-old. That doesn’t help the system, right?
Hiller’s talked about it a lot in terms of the forwards need to come back and really help the defense out. I think they’re probably in that territory.
You hope that some sort of defense opportunity comes to fruition because it is an older, slower unit, and you worry about how long that’s going to last.
Other than Danford, it’s not like the Marlies are flush with exciting younger options.
