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The Toronto Maple Leafs were at their best during their 15-2 streak from late October to early December, playing responsible defensively, getting excellent goaltending from Jack Campbell and contributions on special teams, but December has seen more inconsistent efforts that has seen the Leafs defensive play struggle with greater regularity.
Toronto’s sloppiness was on full display Thursday in a 5-3 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning at Scotiabank Arena, as the Leafs committed multiple turnovers that ended up in the back of their net. Ondrej Kase scored twice, William Nylander added his 12th goal of the season for Toronto, and Jack Campbell made 22 saves in the Leafs third loss in four games.
The Leafs were unable to take advantage of the short-handed Lightning, who were without Brayden Point, Nikita Kucherov and Anthony Cirelli, surrendering a first period lead on Kase’s early power play goal and allowing two Tampa tallies in the middle frame from Ondrej Palat and Taylor Raddysh.
It was a particularly rough night for the defensive pairing of Jake Muzzin and Justin Holl, who were on the ice for Tampa’s first three goals. Leafs head coach Sheldon Keefe was forced to split up, moving Holl to the bottom pairing with rookie Kristians Rubins and promoting Timothy Liljegren into the top four with Muzzin.
“You can’t make those kind of plays and spot (the Lightning) three goals at 5-on-5. We’ll give them the power play goal, but the 5-on-5 goals are inexcusable, those are gifts against a team like that.… Keefe said after the game. “We talked about it before the game starts and then you give that team and goaltender that kind of support and it’s going to be tough to climb out of. I didn’t think we played a terrible game by any means, but our guys worked hard, we had our chances but you just can’t give that type of stuff up. So, decision making, execution with the puck was very poor and it cost us.… Keefe does not have a lot of flexibility on defense with Travis Dermott and Rasmus Sandin injured and likely out for most of December, but the ongoing issues of Muzzin and Holl may have to be addressed by GM Kyle Dubas before the NHL trade deadline in late March.
The Leafs were on the ice at the Ford Performance Centre on Friday in preparation for the final game of their three-game homestand vs. Chicago on Saturday. Petr Mrazek got a lot of work and if he feels good after tomorrow’s morning skate, the veteran will make his first start since October 30.
The defensive switches remained at practice, Kase was promoted to the top line alongside Michael Bunting and Auston Matthews, and Wayne Simmonds was shifted down to the checking line with Nick Ritchie and David Kampf.
Ilya Mikheyev skated on the fourth line with Pierre Engvall and Kyle Clifford, but Keefe said that the big Russian will not make his season debut on Saturday, which likely means that Alex Steeves will play against the Hawks.
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Lot’s of â¤ï¸ for the 💙ðŸ¤
— Norman James (@IamNormanJames) April 26, 2021
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