Minnesota Wild @ Toronto Maple Leafs
07:00 PM at Scotiabank Arena
Watch on: SN, TVAS, FDSNNO, FDSNWI
The Leafs last game was away on January 25 against the Ottawa Senators, which Toronto lost by a score of 2-1 in regulation. The Leafs have a record of 30-18-2 for a 0.620 Points %.
The Minnesota Wild last played away on January 26 against the Chicago Blackhawks. The Wild won by a score of 4-2 in regulation, and their current league record is 29-17-4 for a 0.620 Points %.
Them
Tied with the Leafs in Points %, the Wild are third in the central with a goal differential even more slight than the Leafs at +3.
Their Corsi and Expected Goals are right in the Leafs' range around 20th or worse in the league. Their power play is about as okay as the Leafs' by shot rate, but they put it in the net even less often.
With Anthony Stolarz injured, the Leafs' all-situations Save % has fallen back a little, and they and the Wild are in the top 10 now at .900 and .902 respectively.
The Wild are missing Kirill Kaprizov (surgery and week-to-week) as well as Jonas Brodin and Marcus Johansson, so they are filling in as best they can.
I've always found the Wild boring, and now the Leafs are their twin.
Lines
Dylan Loucks via Daily Faceoff from yesterday.
Matt Boldy - Joel Eriksson Ek - Mats Zuccarello
Marcus Foligno - Marco Rossi - Ryan Hartman
Liam Ohgren - Frederick Gaudreau - Yakov Trenin
Devin Shore - Marat Khusnutdinov - Jakub Lauko
Jacob Middleton - Brock Faber
Jon Merrill - Jared Spurgeon
Travis Dermott - Zach Bogosian
Filip Gustavsson
Marc-André Fleury
Us
The good news is the Leafs are getting healthier. Stolarz was at the optional skate today, as were Matt Knies and John Tavares. Knies is hopeful for Saturday according the Darren Dreger today, and Max Pacioretty is in the lineup for tonight.
Lines
Terry Koshan via Daily Faceoff from yesterday's practice
Bobby McMann - Auston Matthews - Mitch Marner
Max Domi - Pontus Holmberg - William Nylander
Max Pacioretty - Fraser Minten - Nicholas Robertson
Steven Lorentz - David Kämpf - Ryan Reaves
Morgan Rielly - Jake McCabe
Oliver Ekman-Larsson - Chris Tanev
Simon Benoit - Philippe Myers
Joe Woll - expected starter
Matt Murray
The Game
I don't honestly know what to say. The Wild are not the team I'd want to aspire to be, and I don't really know what process is leading the Leafs to such low quality offence. It's easy to fall back on the intentionality paradigm of hockey where everything that happens is by design, and the coach is wrong about it all, but that's how you form a grievance, not actually pick apart the problem.
It usually starts in the defensive zone, this sort of thing. Stay there too much – no matter how successfully you defend – and the clock just runs down on you. I do think there is some intent behind the defence first, keep the score close structure.
Whatever the process is, flashes of skill and a reliance on luck and goaltending to get one-goal wins is a lot less solid a foundation than just getting the puck, keeping the puck and doing smart things with the puck.
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