LGD – Leafs Visit the Island

While the rebuild is most certainly on, today’s iteration of the Toronto Maple Leafs still has to, perhaps unfortunately, play hockey games. They’ll do that tonight when the Leafs travel to Long Island to take on John Tavares and the shockingly fantastic New York Islanders.

New York carries a 35-18-1 record and 71 points into tonight’s match up, tying them with the Detroit Red Wings for 6th in the league standings. The score a ton of goals (fourth most in the league), and have a deep forward group that, even without Kyle Okposo, is hard to shut down. 

That being said, the Islanders aren’t without flaws. They allow the second fewest shots against per game in the NHL, but their 2.78 goals against per game still ranks 23rd. Their penalty kill is also horrifying, but for both teams – their 72.5% penalty kill percentage is worst in the league, while their eight shorthanded goals is best.

If the Leafs can put a good number of shots on net and capitalize on the powerpffffffffffffffffffttttttttt.

Sorry, sorry. I almost made it through that whole opening without remembering how bad the Leafs actually are.

No Dion Phaneuf, no Joffrey Lupul, and Phil Kessel has been practicing on the fourth line. Lovely stuff. But hey, at least David Clarkson is back in the lineup.

Let’s take a moment to appreciate the fact that the Islanders put together their defensive top pairing in one offseason by trading away a few picks and prospects. Also, it’s another opportunity tonight for Nazem Kadri to study how to be as good as John Tavares by lining up across from John Tavares.