Toronto Maple Leafs @ Minnesota Wild
06:00 PM at Xcel Energy Center
Watch on: SNO, FDSNNO, FDSNWI
The Leafs last game was away on November 2 against the St. Louis Blues, which Toronto lost by a score of 4-2 in regulation. The Leafs have a record of 6-5-1 for a 0.542 Points %.
The Minnesota Wild last played at home on November 1 against the Tampa Bay Lightning. The Wild won by a score of 5-3 in regulation, and their current league record is 7-1-2 for a 0.800 Points %.
Them
For time immemorial, the Minnesota Wild have been reliably dull, boring, low-event, mediocre and bland. If this is changing, I'm not sure I can handle it.
The Wild have legitimately good five-on-five results so far this year as a percentage, but with some weird shot quality weightings. They are all about limiting shots against and particularly quality against, making them the best team by Expected Goals Against in the NHL. Oh, and Goals Against too at five-on-five. Overall, they are the fourth best at limiting scoring against.
At the other end of the ice, they are, frankly, bad. And yet Kirill Kaprizov leads the NHL in points, and part of that is coming from the power play. Yes, the Wild's power play is better than the Leafs by any measure you like. Whose isn't?
Kaprizov has six of his 21 points on the power play, so even though the wild shoot very little, and have worse Expected Goals For, Kaprizov is an offensive force at five-on-five. He's not just a hot shooting %, he's shooting smart and in tight and he has a history of always scoring over expected. He is an elite talent having a very hot start to the year.
The Wild defenders don't shoot much, the bottom six doesn't do much, but beyond Kaprizov, Joel Eriksson Ek, Matt Boldy and Mats Zuccarello can hurt you.
Filip Gustavsson, who has had excellent periods of play, is the equal of Anthony Stolarz in Goals Saved Over Expected, an easier trick to pull on the Wild than the Leafs.
Lines
Dylan Loucks via Daily Faceoff from the last practice, and subject to change
Kirill Kaprizov - Marco Rossi - Mats Zuccarello
Marcus Johansson - Joel Eriksson Ek - Matt Boldy
Marcus Foligno - Frederick Gaudreau - Ryan Hartman
Jakub Lauko - Marat Khusnutdinov - Yakov Trenin
Jonas Brodin - Jared Spurgeon
Jacob Middleton - Brock Faber
Declan Chisholm - Zach Bogosian
Filip Gustavsson - assumed starter
Marc-André Fleury
Us
The Leafs are likely to switch up some players for this game since it's a back-to-back. I would put Nick Robertson in on the bottom six and try to match him up with some of those duller lines.
We'll know for sure at gametime.
Lines
Last Game (2024-11-02) via Daily Faceoff and subject to change
Matthew Knies - Auston Matthews - Mitch Marner
Max Pacioretty - John Tavares - William Nylander
Bobby McMann - Max Domi - Pontus Holmberg
Steven Lorentz - David Kämpf - Ryan Reaves
Morgan Rielly - Oliver Ekman-Larsson
Jake McCabe - Chris Tanev
Simon Benoit - Conor Timmins
Anthony Stolarz - starter
Joe Woll
The Game
This is not an easy opponent for the Leafs on paper, but then, neither were the Jets, and Toronto handled them nicely. They aren't going to get heaps of quality chances, so they have to play a tight 60 minute game and shut down the Wild top six.
Part of their problem against the Blues was that even though Tavares had a couple of posts, the middle pair of lines weren't handling their matchups very well. There's no room for that tonight.
Kaprizov is legit, but so is Auston Matthews.
Note the start time. The NHL is trying to be the NFL today.
