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The Toronto Maple Leafs begin a four-game homestand on Saturday against the Edmonton Oilers at Scotiabank Arena on Saturday, facing off with Hart Trophy favorite Connor McDavid and a number of ex-Leafs in a rematch of the two clubs 10 days after a one-sided 5-2 loss in Edmonton on March 1. The Leafs went 3-2 on a five-game road swing through the Pacific Northwest and Western Canada and will look to put some distance between themselves and the Tampa Bay Lightning in the race for second spot in the Atlantic Division.
Tampa has struggled this month, losing four of their last five games, but trail Toronto by four points for home-ice advantage in the first round. The Leafs will continue to tinker with their lineup on Saturday against McDavid (who scored twice in the first period against his favorite boyhood team on March 1), as head coach Sheldon Keefe indicated that he will use 11 forwards and seven blueliners for the third time since the trade deadline.
"(We're) aware of their best players and all that, but we made two mistakes on turnovers in the neutral zone and McDavid turned around and put in our net and within seconds," Keefe said after the optional skate on Saturday. "(The Oilers) played a really sound and hard team game and made it difficult for us to generate any sort of meaningful offense. And that's a big piece for us to be able to contend with here today. We got to tighten things up defensively ourselves and we got to find ways to get through the neutral zone and play more on offense."
Leafs team captain John Tavares will return to the lineup after sitting out one game and will skate with Michael Bunting and a rotation of other forwards with an odd number of forwards. The other line combos will be Alex Kerfoot, Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner, Calle Jarnkrok, Sam Lafferty and William Nylander, and Zach Aston-Reese, David Kampf, and Noel Acciari, but forward line and defensive pairing continuity may be difficult to maintain with an odd number of forwards and blueliners, but that may be on purpose since one of the few things to be accomplished over the next five weeks is some experimentation to see what combinations will work best.
Keefe indicated that the pairing of Jake McCabe and TJ Brodie will remain intact, Mark Giordano skated with Timothy Liljegren, and Morgan Rielly will partner with Justin Holl, with Erik Gustafsson mixing in the seventh D and quarterback of the second power play.
Matt Murray will make his first home start since giving up four goals on eight shots against Florida on January 17 and will face off against Stuart Skinner (19-13-4, 2.83 GAA, .913 save %), coming off an impressive 26-save performance in a 3-2 win in Boston on Thursday.
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