Boston Bruins @ Toronto Maple Leafs
08:00 PM at Scotiabank Arena
Watch on: TBS, truTV, MAX, SN, CBC, TVAS, NESN

The series so far: the Bruins won one in a landslide, the Leafs bounced back with a quality win, and they teamed up for an extremely dull affair that the Bruins won with an assist from the Leafs.

Them

Jim Montgomery is being as forthright as Sheldon Keefe. He's not saying anything for sure, in other words, but he did admit to taking the extra day off into consideration. Yes, that was the day off he complained about a few days ago. All he says is they have a plan and they're following it.

Lines

Fluto Shinzawa via Daily Faceoff from yesterday's practice. Danton Heinen was absent but is going to play.

Jake DeBrusk - Pavel Zacha - David Pastrnak
Brad Marchand - Charlie Coyle - Morgan Geekie
James van Riemsdyk - Trent Frederic - Danton Heinen
John Beecher - Jesper Boqvist - Pat Maroon

Mason Lohrei - Charlie McAvoy
Hampus Lindholm - Brandon Carlo
Parker Wotherspoon - Kevin Shattenkirk

Jeremy Swayman
Linus Ullmark

Us

William Nylander is not a sure thing for tonight's game. He did, however, take part fully in practice for the first time yesterday. Bobby McMann seems to be out entirely.

That seems to heavily imply Nylander is in, and Sheldon Keefe confirmed they are assuming he is in.

TJ Brodie did not take Ilya Lyubushkin's place yesterday as Lyubushkin had flown out to California to see his newest daughter as many seemed to assume. He took Timothy Liljegren's spot, so he seems to be the odd man out tonight. Keefe lasted three games playing Liljegren, which is more than I expected him to manage. How you feel about that depends on how you feel about Liljegren's play and how much you buy in on the Keefe hates the young players stuff.

With Nylander in and Dewar out, the PK has to try to improve with a limited set of forward options.

Lines

Mark Masters via Daily Faceoff the lineup with Nylander from practice:

Tyler Bertuzzi - Auston Matthews - Max Domi
Matthew Knies - John Tavares - Mitch Marner
Calle Järnkrok - Pontus Holmberg - William Nylander
Nicholas Robertson - David Kämpf - Ryan Reaves

Morgan Rielly - Ilya Lyubushkin
Simon Benoit - Jake McCabe
Joel Edmundson - T.J. Brodie

Ilya Samsonov
Joe Woll

The Game

I advise winning it.

To paraphrase some of our commenters during the last game: the Leafs need to get out of their own way. They have to stop running out of plays to go tussle with Brad Marchand. They have to commit fully to defending for the entire game, and that means every single player. But most importantly, they can't play that dull five-on-five game with no offence to speak of that they indulged in last time.

You win by using all your skill, and so far, the offence (again) is just not there at five-on-five until the Bruins just start holding their lead, confident their goalie has it.

Samsonov was horrible on the Frederic goal against. But he had help from the team, and they dawdled around in the neutral zone for most of the game when they didn't have a power play.

I think the Leafs can win against the Bruins if they actually get their heads in the game. But with two playmaking wingers wandering around confused about what to do most of the time, it's going to take a lot of extra effort from everyone else or else for the power play luck to turn.

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