LGD: Welcome to the Austonless Show
6 years ago
The Toronto Maple Leafs are always down for a good, healthy rivalry matchup.
With key playoff-bound points on the line, though, the Leafs couldn’t be facing their division rivals in Boston at a worse time; without Auston Matthews in the lineup, it’s a big blow to their overall level of competition against a team that’s been flying high.
THE BRUINS
| LW | C | RW |
|---|---|---|
 BRAD MARCHAND |  PATRICE BERGERON |  DAVID PASTRNAK |
 JAKE DEBRUSK |  DAVID KREJCI |  RYAN SPOONER |
 DANTON HEINEN |  RILEY NASH |  DAVID BACKES |
 TIM SCHALLER |  SEAN KURALY |  NOEL ACCIARI |
| DEFENSIVE PAIRINGS | |
|---|---|
 ZDENO CHARA |  CHARLIE MCAVOY |
 TOREY KRUG |  BRANDON CARLO |
 MATT GRZELCYK |  KEVAN MILLER |
The Bruins made a few little moves this week by picking up Nick Holden (who is not expected to be in the lineup) and moving out Frank Vatrano (who was almost never in the lineup, anyway).
Danton Heinen has been the name to watch lately, putting up 12 goals and 39 points in 54 games this year and counting. He’s one of the highest-scoring rookies in the league, matching pace with guys like Alex Debrincat, Nico Hischier, and Kyle Connor.
As always, though, Boston’s top line is their imminent threat. Brad Marchand came right back from his suspension to continue scoring, and currently sits 28th league-wide with 55 points (despite only playing in 45 games so far out of a possible 58). Between him, Patrice Bergeron, and David Pastrnak, Toronto will have their hands full.
THE LEAFS
| LW | C | RW |
|---|---|---|
 PATRICK MARLEAU |  NAZEM KADRI |  MITCH MARNER |
 ZACH HYMAN |  WILLIAM NYLANDER |  CONNOR BROWN |
 JAMES VAN RIEMSDYK |  TYLER BOZAK |  KASPERI KAPANEN |
 LEO KOMAROV |  DOMINIC MOORE |  JOSH LEIVO |
We haven’t seen Nazem Kadri as a top line center in a little while!
Another thing to note is the William Nylander At Center storyline, which is something to watch moving forward. Mike Babcock has made it clear that he’s hoping to give Willie a shot at the pivot, which will either go incredibly well (because Nylander is perfect in everything he does) or crash and burn against Boston and the elite face-off numbers of David Krejci.
Still a fourth-line role for Leo Komarov. Still a role at all for Roman Polak. Not too much else to say.
STARTING GOALIES
It’s Frederik Andersen for the Leafs, which is really no big surprise. Although he’s had a few substandard games lately, he’s still clearly in the running for the Vezina this year, and the team is playing him in basically every game they humanly can until he collapses in a pile of dust.
For Boston, Tuukka Rask will start, although he’s trending in the opposite direction from Andersen. After a rough start to the season, he was able to concede some starts to the currently rock-solid Anton Khudobin, which left him with a much more manageable workload. His .922 save percentage in all situations is just slightly below Andersen’s .923, but a lot of that has been happening recently – which isn’t a good sign for Toronto.
NOTES
- This is the last time we’ll see these two teams play each other in the regular season, but it’s hard to picture a scenario where they face anyone but each other in the first round of the playoffs – so although the players often insist they read little into those kinds of predictions, expect this to be a matchup with even less love lost than normal.
- The Bruins have won four of their last five games, but the firepower they had to start the season is starting to give way a bit to fatigue. After an absolute thrashing by the Vancouver Canucks last weekend, they were only able to earn two points against the Calgary Flames by taking the game to overtime – and then nearly lost to the Edmonton Oilers before taking advantage of a near-comical third-period collapse by Edmonton to pull off a 3-2 win in regulation. Toronto may be down Matthews right now, but Boston hasn’t exactly been as lethal as they were even a few months ago.
- At this point, the goaltending battle looks evenly matched, but Andersen has been getting as tired as the Bruins lately. His numbers, while still game-saving on more than one occasion lately, haven’t been quite as infallible as they were back in December and even January. He’s hitting a point where the team allowing 35-40 (and beyond) shots a night is catching up, and Boston may try to take advantage of that, particularly using their top line.
LGD BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE PINT
Make the Pint your home for all things game day. We give away a free pound of wings during every game either home or away. 4.40$ mugs of Bud and Bud Lights.
Recent articles from Cat Silverman
