The 2020 play-in round series between the Blue Jackets and the Maple Leafs continues tonight with Game 3. The play-in series’ are just five-game series, so the winner of tonight’s game puts themselves one win away from the true 2020 Stanley Cup playoffs.

Story lines going into this game are aplenty, as is usually the case in a competitive series like this one has been.

Primarily on most fans’ minds will be the effects of the injury to Jake Muzzin and how the lines will have to change because of his absence. Some will seek revenge against the prime mover of the collision that caused the injury, Pierre-Luc Dubois. Some will seek to get revenge by burying the Blue Jackets behind a 2-1 series lead. Some inevitably just want to watch the blue-and-white win a “playoff series” for the first time since 2003.

Another story line has been the epic goaltending/defensive battle between Frederik Andersen and the Leafs, and Jonas Korpisalo and the Blue Jackets. Each goaltender has a shutout in this series, and both have save percentages above 95%, which is ridiculously good. Both teams have had a game where they absolutely drowned any offensive hopes of the other team, Columbus obviously doing so in Game 1 and Toronto in Game 2. Will tonight see Columbus pull the tug-of-war back towards them? Or will Toronto carry momentum through their offense to keep the goals coming?

Only time will tell.

Lines

Here are the expected lines for both teams for tonight’s game:

LW	C	RW	Forwards
ZACH HYMAN Rating: 74.6#33 LW	AUSTON MATTHEWS Rating: 82.3#6 C	MITCH MARNER Rating: 76.6#18 RW	FL1 Rating Rating: 77.83#5 FL1
WILLIAM NYLANDER Rating: 76.1#23 LW	JOHN TAVARES Rating: 77.6#15 C	ILYA MIKHEYEV Rating: 74.0#42 RW	FL2 Rating Rating: 75.90#4 FL2
NICHOLAS ROBERTSON	ALEXANDER KERFOOT Rating: 70.8#113 C	KASPERI KAPANEN Rating: 71.5#87 RW	FL3 Rating Rating: 71.17#19 FL3
KYLE CLIFFORD Rating: 69.5#131 LW	PIERRE ENGVALL Rating: 71.0#98 C	JASON SPEZZA Rating: 69.4#126 RW	FL4 Rating Rating: 69.98#21 FL4

DEFENSIVE PAIRINGS	Defense
TRAVIS DERMOTT Rating: 71.7#83 LD	JUSTIN HOLL Rating: 72.0#61 RD	DL1 Rating Rating: 71.84#27 DL1
MORGAN RIELLY Rating: 75.3#14 LD	CODY CECI Rating: 70.8#94 RD	DL2 Rating Rating: 73.05#17 DL2
MARTIN MARINCIN Rating: 71.0#13 LD	TYSON BARRIE Rating: 75.3#21 RD	DL3 Rating Rating: 73.19#5 DL3

LW	C	RW	Forwards
ALEXANDRE TEXIER Rating: 72.6#70 LW	PIERRE-LUC DUBOIS Rating: 74.6#38 C	CAM ATKINSON Rating: 75.3#28 RW	FL1 Rating Rating: 74.17#25 FL1
GUSTAV NYQUIST Rating: 72.6#68 LW	ALEXANDER WENNBERG Rating: 69.7#122 C	OLIVER BJORKSTRAND Rating: 77.8#10 RW	FL2 Rating Rating: 73.35#18 FL2
NICK FOLIGNO Rating: 72.5#61 LW	BOONE JENNER Rating: 71.6#98 C	LIAM FOUDY	FL3 Rating Rating: 72.43#8 FL3
ERIC ROBINSON Rating: 70.0#117 LW	RILEY NASH Rating: 69.7#137 C	EMIL BEMSTROM Rating: 71.3#91 RW	FL4 Rating Rating: 70.33#14 FL4

DEFENSIVE PAIRINGS	Defense
ZACH WERENSKI Rating: 78.4#5 LD	SETH JONES Rating: 78.3#4 RD	DL1 Rating Rating: 78.38#1 DL1
VLADISLAV GAVRIKOV Rating: 71.8#80 LD	DAVID SAVARD Rating: 72.4#54 RD	DL2 Rating Rating: 72.06#23 DL2
RYAN MURRAY Rating: 73.7#40 LD	MARKUS NUTIVAARA Rating: 72.4#52 RD	DL3 Rating Rating: 73.05#6 DL3

Who to watch for?

Toronto

For the Leafs, two players are going to have special attentions on them: Travis Dermott and Martin Marincin. As Dermott appears to be stepping up into a bigger role in Muzzin’s absence on the pairing with Justin Holl, it’ll be great to see him take a step in establishing himself as a top-four defender by holding his own, or even excelling in that role. And of course, with Marincin drawing in for Muzzin, it will be interesting if this puts a hole in the Maple Leafs’ defence for Columbus to exploit, or if Marty has his typical, once-in-a-blue-moon, excellent game when it really matters.

Columbus

After getting shut out in Game 2, Columbus’ scorers will be called on to answer the bell before this series slips away from them. It’ll be interesting to see how Cam Atkinson and Oliver Bjorkstrand can change their strategies to get more pucks on Andersen tonight, in hopes of putting just their second goal in the series past him.

Starting Goalies

No one will be surprised to hear that Korpisalo and Andersen will reprise their roles as netminders for their teams in tonight’s contest. As mentioned above, the continuation of their battle to stop pucks will be entertaining to say the least.

The game will begin at 8pm Eastern and is broadcast on Sportsnet Ontario, and streaming on the NHL.TV application on most devices. See you there, and go Leafs go!

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