Five things to watch when the New Jersey Devils take on the Toronto Maple Leafs:
1. Jesper Bratt's return The 20-year-old Swede will be making his long-anticipated debut. It couldn't come at a better time with the Devils dropping four of their first five on this extended road trip and getting little secondary scoring in the process. Bratt won't erase that issue but he should help mitigate it. He'll also give the Devils another guy who can transport the puck through the neutral zone, which they could certainly use.
2. Stingy defense If you ask 10 people what Toronto's biggest problem is, nine of them will say team defense. It's easy to understand why. The right side of Toronto's blue line, in particular, is scary for the wrong reasons and their style of play generally lends itself to a good dose of chances against. That hasn't been the case, though – at least not of late. Over the last five games, Toronto has conceded just 32 high-danger chances at 5v5.
For perspective, it's felt like the Devils have been very pedestrian offensively and they still generated 60 high-danger chances at 5v5 over the same span.
The Leafs have done a great job of bottling teams up and keeping things to the outside. Creating offense at 5v5 tonight could be tougher than you'd think.
3. NJ PK vs TOR PP Toronto's power play is lethal. Even without Auston Matthews, they're not a unit you want to mess with. They rank 2nd in Corsi For/60, 2nd in Expected Goals For/60, and 5th in Goals For/60.
While New Jersey's penalty kill hasn't been as good of late (hmmm, I wonder why), they're still a top-10 unit in terms of shot suppression.
It'll be interesting to see who wins this matchup tonight. Given the Devils' inability to stay out of the box, we could see a lot of it.
4. A potential goaltending duel Frederik Andersen and Keith Kinkaid are off to really strong starts this year. Among 38 goaltenders to play at least 250 minutes at 5v5 thus far, Andersen ranks 9th with a .935 save percentage and Kinkaid ranks 10th with a .934SV%. They are also both top-10 in Goals Saved Above Average (GSAA).
5. A 4th line mismatch Toronto looks to have a decent sized edge when it comes to 4th lines. Their unit owns a 52.12 Corsi For% and +13 chance differential in ~53 minutes together. Brian Boyle and J.S. Dea are rocking a 43.86 CF% in ~62 minutes on the same line. Some shooting luck has really masked their struggles and I'm not sure how much Miles Wood will be able to prop them up.
Here are the projected lineups.
New Jersey Devils
Taylor Hall - Nico Hischier - Kyle Palmieri Marcus Johansson - Brett Seney -Jesper Bratt Blake Coleman - Travis Zajac - Joey Anderson Brian Boyle - J.S. Dea - Miles Wood
Mirco Mueller - Sami Vatanen Andy Greene - Damon Severson Will Butcher - Ben Lovejoy
Keith Kinkaid
Toronto (via DailyFaceoff.com)
Zach Hyman - John Tavares - Mitch Marner Patrick Marleau - Nazem Kadri - Kasperi Kapanen Andreas Johnsson - Par Lindholm - Connor Brown Tyler Ennis - Frederik Gauthier - Josh Leivo
Morgan Rielly - Ron Hainsey Jake Gardiner - Nikita Zaitsev Travis Dermott - Igor Ozhiganov
Frederik Andersen
Puck drop is just after 7:00 p.m. ET and can be seen on MSG+, TSN4, and TVAS.
Numbers via NaturalStatTrick.com and Corsica.Hockey.
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