Montréal Canadiens @ Toronto Maple Leafs
07:00 PM at Scotiabank Arena
Watch on: SN, RDS

There's nothing like a good ole' Leafs vs Habs matchup. The history! The tradition! The utter banality of playing the same team three games in a row in preseason!

Ah, well, here we are again. Tonight's game will feature one change for sure, it's a Sportsnet game.

Them

Montréal have made some roster cuts, putting several players through waivers and trying to distill a large number of players down to something like their playing roster.

Today's roster – on the road for them – is anybody's guess. They don't like to issue rosters in advance these days.

One small clue:

Us

The Leafs are putting their most serious lineup on the ice for this home game. If we assume the William Nylander at centre business continues, there are four strong lines from this roster with the only question being how to sort out Lafferty and Robertson.

Calle Järnkrok is still out, so switch him and Robertson, and this is the real forward lineup.

On defence, the day-to-day John Klingberg is still out. And that opens up an opportunity for Liljegren to make a case for more ice time (I think Klingberg's five-on-five minutes are available). Simon Benoit, in his first game off of an injury, was not good on Saturday, and this can be another try at making a good impression for him.

The news:

Lines

Tyler Bertuzzi - Auston Matthews - Mitch Marner
Matt Knies - John Tavares - Sam Lafferty
Max Domi - William Nylander - Nick Robertson
Noah Gregor - David Kämpf - Ryan Reaves

Morgan Rielly - TJ Brodie
Jake McCabe - Timothy Liljegren
Simon Benoit - Mikko Kokkonen

Ilya Samsonov
Keith Petruzzelli

The Game

The Leafs may choose to play Petruzzelli in this game, since Samsonov has already had one good outing, and there's really no need to use him in preseason.

With no Fraser Minten or Easton Cowan, the focus is back on that Nylander line, the fit of Bertuzzi on the top line. Only two more games remain after this one, another home game vs Detroit and a return match there on the road to end preseason.

Game Coverage