Toronto Maple Leafs

How Deep Into Autumn Will It Take Leafs To Fall?

More than one factor will be at work in determining when the Leafs solid start will begin to lose it’s shine.  I admit we’re only one game into the season - but why put off what I can do today until tomorrow?  Let’s look at the upcoming schedule and the potential for the Leafs solid play to continue, or decline.

Saturday at home vs. Les Canadiens: The Habs will be playing their second game on consecutive nights after losing a 2-1 heart-breaker in the shootout against the Sabres.  Carey Price stopped 35 of 36 shots and came very close to stealing the show.  Similarly, Vesa Toskala shut down all of the Wings not named Holmstrom in stopping 35 of 37 shots in the Leafs opener on Thursday against Detroit.  Thus, it could be expected that this game will become quite the goaltenders duel.

Luckily for the Leafs, Vesa Toskala came out on top in the majority of his matchups with Montreal last season. In 6 games, all starts, against the Habs last year, Toskala had a 4-1-1 record with a 2.62 GAA and a .910 save percentage, giving up 16 goals on 177 shots against.  4 of those goals came in the only regulation loss, where Toskala faced only 25 shots against.  Thus in the remaining 5 games, he gave up 12 goals on 152 shots which actually works out to a .921 SV%.

Unfortunately for the Leafs, Carey Price also played quite well against his opposition on Saturday night, sporting a 4-1-0 record in his 5 starts vs. Toronto.  His numbers were even more stellar than Toskala’s with a 2.17 GAA and a .935 SV% vs. the Leafs.

Oddly, in the 8 games the two teams played against each other, Toskala and Price only faced off in three of them.  Each of them won a game in regulation, and the third matchup went all the way to a shoot out where Montreal pulled out the W.  Frankly, considering Montreal’s players and Toronto’s line up, that result in the shoot-out is far from shocking.

Either way, the matchup should be quite exciting, but I give the advantage to the Leafs due to the fact that Montreal played an OT game the night previous, and Toronto has had a couple of nights off to recuperate.

Monday at home vs. the St. Louis Blues:  This Thanksgiving day matchup with the Blues has potential let down written all over it.  That being said, the Leafs might very well steal the game.  The Leafs rarely play daytime games, due to their television deals and typical Saturday Night presence, they are not normally active on Sundays which is the typical choice for NHL day time tilts.

St. Louis outplayed the Leafs quite badly in the most recent of their two preseason matchups.  A lot of that loss can be chalked up to a weak line up and a horrible start in front of Curtis Joseph, so perhaps the Leafs can shrug that one off easily.

For them to outplay the workmanlike Blues, the Leafs will need to choke off a speedy young team that plays a game very similar to their own.  They will have to bottle up the neutral zone and collapse down low whenever Lee Stempniak, Brad Boyes, and Andy MacDonald are on the ice… not to mention holding Tkachuk, Kariya, Perron, and Oshie off the board.  St. Louis will be an improved squad this season, but they aren’t that much further along their rebuild than the Leafs.

The let down in this instance is more likely due to the decrease in the level of the “competition”.  Following games vs. top contenders Detroit and Montreal, the Blues could very well seem like easy pickings, especially if the Leafs win game 2 against a very strong Habs squad.  If Ron Wilson has a strong hold of this young club though, he may very well prevent such a let down.  Either way, only time will tell.

Expect an exciting weekend of hockey from a quick, exuberant, young Leafs squad.  I hope you all enjoy the match ups, just try to shy away from doom and gloom - or pie in the sky - type predictions at this point.

Enjoy the ride, it’s bound to stop some time.