Toronto Maple Leafs

“It’s Going To Be A Fun Season”

So says Jonas Gustavsson.  At least… that is “if we can continue like this.”  The new guy in net is saying all the right things after he came within one beauty of a breakaway pass from Bryan Rafalski to Dan Cleary of shutting out the Detroit Red Wings in a 5-1 Leafs victory.  Stopping 35 of 36 shots by the Wings, Gustavsson upped his save percentage to .918 on the year, tying him with fellow Swede Henrik Lundqvist for 11th best in the NHL, and lowered his GAA to 2.60, which makes him 15th best in the NHL in that regard.

Gustavsson has now gone 3-2-3 in his 8 games this season, with one of the regulation losses being a substitution effort against the Washington Capitals in which the Leafs actually outscored the Caps 3-2 with the Monster in net.  Thus it might be more reasonable to say the Leafs are 3-1-3 in games started by Gustavsson with his only loss coming in a 2-1 game against the Ottawa Senators.  He posted a .929 save percentage in that start, and looked pretty damn spectacular in the loss.  The Leafs have a point in every start Gustavsson has had since then, and are riding a wave of 10 points gained in the last 6 games back to the realm of respectability.

The Leafs now sit tied in points with the Florida Panthers at 11.  They also continued their stretch of blanking the opposition on the PK, again going 5 for 5 - including a 5 on 3 situation to start the 3rd, and upping their kill rate to 73% on the season.  They are no longer the outright worst defensive team in the NHL, having tied Florida at 3.60 goals against per game, and their goals for per game has tied the Tampa Bay Lightning for 19th best in the NHL at 2.60 per game.  Over their points streak they have stopped 24 of 28 power plays for an 85.7% kill rate, they’ve scored 4 goals per game, and they’ve allowed 3.17 goals against per game.

In scoring 6 even strength goals in the past 2 games, the Leafs have improved their 5 on 5 scoring ratio to 0.68, which ranks them 27th in the NHL (far better than 30th a few days ago).  They now have 21 goals at 5 on 5, ranking them 25th in the NHL.  They sit tied with Calgary for 9th in the NHL in blocked shots, registering 221.  They are 11th in the NHL in take-aways with 110.

Over their past 10 games, they have a better record than the New York Rangers, Atlanta Thrashers, Florida Panthers, Carolina Hurricanes, St. Louis Blues, Edmonton Oilers, and Anaheim Ducks.  Within their own divisional standings, they are within 5 points of Boston, Ottawa, and Montreal, who all sit tied for 2nd in the North East with 16 points.

Phil Kessel finally scored his first marker as a Leaf on a tap in, and picked up an assist on the power play with a rifle wrist shot.  He now has a goal and 2 assists for 3 points in his first 3 games as a Leaf.  His line has looked dangerous in all 3 games, and it appears that the Wilson tactic of using Kessel to make other players better is working, particularly in the case of Jason Blake and John Mitchell, who have garnered points in back to back games.  Mitchell with his first 2 goals of the season, and Blake with a goal and 2 assists.  The line has combined for 4 goals and 4 assists for 8 points in the Leafs last 2 games.

Blake is also proving dogged on defense, as he now sits tied for 4th in the NHL in take-aways with 18, alongside Martin St. Louis and Jamie Benn.  Unlike St. Louis, Blake has 12 hits, and only 9 give aways.  In essence, he is proving to be more valuable as the season progresses.  Hopefully the Kessel addition will continue to boost his game.  Lee Stempniak is also performing in a similar way, producing 16 take-aways to sit tied for 10th in the NHL alongside the likes of Richard Park, Sean Bergenheim, and Matt Duchene.

On another positive note, the Leafs other top line is playing well, as Grabovski, Ponikarovsky, and Kulemin are linking up well again. Grabovski has 2 goals and 6 assists over the course of the point streak, while Ponikarovsky has 3 goals and an assist, and Kulemin has 3 goals.  Thus they’ve combined for 8 goals and 7 assists, for 15 points over the past 6 games.

As far as the D goes, Jeff Finger chipped in with a goal and an assist against the Wings as well as another blocked shot. Ian White added another 2 assists, boosting his total to 2 goals and 3 assists over the six game point streak, and 9 points on the season.  White is on pace for a career high 49 point season, and is currently tied for 17th in the NHL for scoring amongst D men, along with Shea Weber, Lubomir Visnovsky, Duncan Keith, Marek Zidlicky, Zdeno Chara, Adrian Aucoin, Kimmo Timonen, Derek Morris, and Alexander Edler.  I’d say White has finally arrived as a point producing, top 4 minute blue liner.

Finger now has 19 hits (3.17 hpg) and 16 blocked shots (2.67 bspg) on the season. Francois Beauchemin chipped in another assist to go with 3 hits and 4 blocked shots as he continues to improve alongside Finger.  Beauchemin is averaging 1 hit per game, and 1.93 blocked shots per game.  Mike Komisarek is averaging 2.73 hits per game, and 2.53 blocked shots per game.  Ian White averages 0.80 hits per game, and 1.33 blocked shots per game.  Tomas Kaberle averages 0.53 hits per game, and 1.53 blocked shots per game.  Luke Schenn averages 1.80 hits per game, and 1.13 blocked shots per game as his minutes have dipped this season.

Finger also looks vastly improved in his handling of the puck, as he only has 5 giveaways on the season, averaging 0.83 per game.  By way of comparison, White (0.87), Kaberle (0.87), Schenn (0.53) and Beauchemin (0.80) are all comparable or superior, but that was the main weakness to Finger’s defensive game, and he has the best team averages in those aforementioned categories of hits and blocked shots.  Komisarek’s give away totals are a bit scary at 1.27 per game.

This Leafs team is beginning to look more and more like the squad everyone anticipated hotly in the pre-season.  Meanwhile in the AHL, the Marlies are looking like they’ll be fairly solid this season.  That being said, they lost 4-1 last night, to the best team in the league, the Rochester Americans.  Stålberg, Hanson, and Zigomanis were all -2 on the night, and Jiri Tlusty was a -1, but he added an assist to up his point total to 11.  If Stålberg, Hanson, Tlusty, and Bozak keep producing, the farm team should be fine, and we’ll likely see all of them before the end of the season, once injuries begin to take a toll - as they inevitably will.

So I suppose it’s time to have some faith in the Leafs starting goal-tender, and perhaps be hopeful he’s right when he says this season might be fun.  If Barack Obama set a precedent by being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for giving the world hope, one only wonders what sort of awards the Monster is due as this season progresses.