Preview: Maple Leafs vs. Penguins at the Hall of Fame game

Pittsburgh Penguins @ Toronto Maple Leafs
07:00 PM at Scotiabank Arena
Watch on: TVAS, TSN4, ATTSN-PT

Opponent’s Site: PensBurgh

The Leafs last game was at home on November 8 against the Vegas Golden Knights, which Toronto lost by a score of 4-3 in OT. The Leafs have a record of 7-4-3 so far.

The Pittsburgh Penguins last played an away game on November 9 against the Washington Capitals. The Penguins won by a score of 4-1, and their current league record is 5-6-2.

Them

The Penguins didn’t have a practice in Toronto yesterday, so there isn’t news yet about who is in net, but you may notice a familiar name on their lines in Filip Hållander. He was drafted by the Penguins in 2018, but then his rights were traded to the Leafs in 2020 as a part of the deal which saw Kasperi Kapanen go from the Leafs back to the Penguins who drafted him in 2014. Yes, there’s a lot of back and forth here between these teams already, but there’s still more as the Leafs then sent Hållander back to the Penguins in 2021 to acquire Jared McCann, who was used as cannon fodder for the Seattle Expansion Draft, so he never actually wore a Leafs jersey in a game.

Related

Who is Filip Hallander?

Hållander’s first NHL game of this season was on Wednesday, as he was called up to the Penguins to debut on their fourth line. Both the Leafs ad the Penguins clearly like him as a prospect, with Dubas even saying he was picked by the Penguins in the Draft one spot before they would have taken him (they got Sean Durzi instead), so both sides will be watching to see if they can claim a “win” on the trades tonight.

Otherwise, it’s the Penguins, and you know when the Donk-Crosby-Flibbet line is out you better play some good defence. But do the Leafs know how to do that at all? We shall see.

Lines

Source: Matt Vensel via Daily Faceoff

Jake Guentzel - Sidney Crosby - Bryan Rust
Jason Zucker - Evgeni Malkin - Rickard Rakell
Brock McGinn - Jeff Carter - Danton Heinen
Filip Hallander - Ryan Poehling - Josh Archibald

Marcus Pettersson - Kris Letang
Pierre-Olivier Joseph - Jeff Petry
Brian Dumoulin - Jan Rutta

Tristan Jarry
Casey DeSmith

Us

The Leafs are back with Källgren and Pertuzzelli for another game, but reports have come in that the injury to Ilya Samsonov may not be as serious as first believed, and that Matt Murray may be ready to play as early as tomorrow, so this could be the final game with the backup-backup goalie tandem.

Lines

Alex Kerfoot - Auston Matthews - Mitch Marner
Nick Robertson - John Tavares - William Nylander
Zach Aston-Reese - David Kämpf - Denis Malgin
Michael Bunting - Pierre Engvall - Calle Järnkrok

Morgan Rielly - Timothy Liljegren
TJ Brodie - Justin Holl
Mark Giordano - Rasmus Sandin

Erik Källgren
Keith Petruzzelli

The Game

Toronto vs Pittsburgh

Tonight is the Hall of Fame game which will honour the new inductees: Daniel Alfredsson, Roberto Luongo, Daniel Sedin, Henrik Sedin, and Riikka Sallinen in the player categories, and Herb Carnegie in the builder categories.

You can expect additional pre-game programming to tie into Remembrance Day, which means the puck drop for the game probably won’t be until about 7:20, at the earliest. Börje Salming will also be honoured both at tonight’s and tomorrow’s games, and the sad reality is this special recognition is coming now because everyone believes it will likely be the final time he will be capable of making a trip to Canada due to his rapidly deteriorating health from ALS complications. Needless to say, this is a ceremony worth watching.