Maple Leafs (39-21-7) vs Red Wings (poop emoji)

7:00 pm ET

TV: CBC probably

Our game preview with lineups is here.

After two games on the road against top Cup contending teams — the Tampa Bay Lightning and Nashville Predators — the Leafs come home for a big Saturday night game against... the Detroit Red Wings?

Welp.

It’s probably even worse than you think. I know I thought the Red Wings were in a bad situation due to having a number of just awful contracts and not being so awful to give themselves a better chance of getting a high draft pick, not necessarily that they were a terrible team. A quick look at the standings, however, shows that Detroit has been so awful recently that they’ve fallen into the bottom 5 in the league. They might even get caught by Ottawa or Arizona (also LOL Arizona passed Vancouver and Buffalo!)

Seems like a classic trap game eh? At least the Leafs have Auston Matthews back, who is always fun to watch against Detroit, and a lot of players fighting to hold onto their roster spots. Connor Carrick, Travis Dermott, and Roman Polak have cemented themselves as the rotation for the 3rd pairing now that Nikita Zaitsev is back again, while Kasperi Kapanen and Andreas Johnsson have still gotten regular games in place of Dominic Moore, Matt Martin, and of course... Josh Leivo.

SO LET’S GO LEAFS!

ICYMI

Travis Dermott is good; maybe you didn’t know that? | by Katya

Jamie Lee Rattray wins Jayna Hefford Trophy | by Annie

What hobbies do you think Josh Leivo has mastered during his time in the pressbox?

Learning to speak Finnish and its FIFTEEN noun cases25
The Nupps stitch in knitting4
How to safely cook Fugu (unless it’s for any Leafs ahead of him on the depth chart)15
Counting the grains of wood on his usual bench63
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