The Toronto Maple Leafs are coming off a dominant 5-1 victory over the Montreal Canadiens in their first preseason game on Monday night. The Leafs are now 3-2 in preseason and the Habs are now 0-5. Obviously Montreal would like to even the score against the Buds with a victory tonight and their first of the preseason.
The Leafs on the other hand would like to continue to ramp up their play as these eight games wind down and they prepare for the Winnipeg Jets on October 4th.
Matthews and Nylander sure look ready, what a performance they put on last game with Matthews scoring a hat trick and Willy sniping a beauty, bar down. It was sure a lovely sound hearing the iron get drilled with the puck after Nylander rifled in a no doubter from the hash marks. Matthews stunned Montreal’s Al Montoya with his first shot, had incredible hand-eye coordination on his second and finished on a breakaway for his third.
Matthews looks faster and much more confident as the Leafs look to take the Eastern Conference by storm. The only one that may get in the way in the Atlantic is the Lightning who have the best chance to top the Leafs. It may difficult for some of us Leafs fans to accept the fact we are a team that is going to compete for a top spot, but it’s here so enjoy the glory.
It’s certainly been a long time coming.
The Leafs players and coaching staff are very high on Frederik Andersen as he enters his second season with Toronto after being scooped up and signed to a five year deal worth 25 million. A bold yet strategic move by management to take advantage of the situation that Anaheim was in with two young number one goalies; brilliant.
I will update the lineups when they are posted.
Travis Dermott:
Dermott who was very solid in last year’s AHL playoff run comes in at 5’11… and about 205 pounds. He’s an all-round defenseman who has been my front runner since halfway through this summer and I still believe he’s going to be the one to take over Marincin’s job on the third pairing. One can hope…
I’m really hoping Babcock gets him into the lineup tonight to continue to show what he’s got and let both Borgman and Rosen continue to play with either the Marlies or Leafs and simply be the extra defenseman until and injury occurs.
The Leafs biggest need of improvement on this team was improving the defense. Dermott needs to take the next step and this could be his golden opportunity to do so. With Liljegren in the mix, Dermott needs to establish himself with the Leafs and secure a job. This will let Liljegren push someone else out and when he does the Leafs will be that much better. He certainly looks to be quite the steal at 17th overall in this year’s NHL Draft.
What do you think, will Dermott be starting on the Leafs roster come October 4th?
Thanks for reading, happy hump day!