Toronto Maple Leafs @ Boston Bruins
08:00 PM at TD Garden
Watch on: ABC, ESPN+, SN, CBC, TVAS
Note the start time.
We'll update the lines with any changes in warmups.
This may be the last game of the season. It might be the ticket to round 2. That's how it works, it's supposed to be uncertain with no guarantees. You're supposed to hope, not for a hedge your bets, "I told you so" loss. Not for a ticket to anger and recriminations, but for what could be. Not for anti-fandom. Not for elitist pessimism.
Later, later we can talk about what is good and bad, and right and wrong. Later. That's not for now. Now is for the really hard part for both teams. And for us. Because chances are neither team is winning the Cup this year but they are both trying.
If you never want disappointment, go be a Ducks fan, they pick high in the draft every year. And if they get good, find another bad team because bad teams are easy. The Leafs were easy when they were bad. Those were the days, weren't they? When you could write five paragraphs of frothing indignation about Dave Nonis and get that bile out of your system. Simple, easy times when everything was bad and we were all so righteous.
This is the price everyone pays for all those easy days. Edge of your seat time. No easy answers. Just fallible bodies, fallible people, doing their best. Maybe they'll win.
Punch the ticket, guys. Slay the beast and then go try round two against the Panthers again.
Matthews to play (it seems), Woll might have been injured at the end of the last game. We could see Ilya Samsonov with Martin Jones.
Only sure thing is no McMann.
