The Toronto Maple Leafs played a terrible game last night against the Sharks.
Granted, I spent a large portion of the game picking pumpkin seeds out of a big bowl of pumpkin guts, so I more or less listened to the game on the radio. It was fun, it reminded me of when I was a kid and I used to get sent to bad after the first period but stay up listening on the radio.
From what I saw/heard, the Leafs played one of their worst games of the year so far, so i was surprised to look at the stats and see the Leafs had even just 48% of the shot attempts. This despite only getting two shots in the second period.
Luckily, there is more than just shot-attempts to go off of, and a deeper look reveals that the Sharks outshot the Leafs 32-17. If you look at scoring chances, however, the Leafs had more than the Sharks did. This suggests that the Sharks spent a lot of the game trying to overcome the Leafs five-man collapse, where the team falls back towards the slot in order to let easier shots go from the blue-line.
I am skeptical of this strategy because shots get tipped and goalies get screened, but for a team with a seemingly low defensive acumen, it might be the best idea. It was a weird game though, because afterwards my impression was that the Leafs got crushed and Andersen kept them in it, but the stats don’t seem to bear that out 100%.
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Perhaps it’s more of an example of how we strive to find a pattern and a narrative in ever game, than anything else. Andersen was good, and the Sharks were the better team, but it’s interesting to look the next day and see that the game seemed to be a lot closer than it appeared. Perhaps the Leafs had their best looks when I had my head in a pumpkin? Hard to say.
Bright Spot
Whether or not he faced a lot of high-quality chances, Andersen was sharp last night. He allowed only one 5v5 goal, and any time your goalie does that, you will have a good chance to win the game. Can’t do anything about a powerplay goal – teams are scoring most of the time when you give them four power-plays.
So given the rightful consternation surrounding Andersen – he’s letting in soft goals basically every game – this was undoubtedly a great performance. That said, he also had a great performance last week against LA and followed it up with two duds. Consistency is what the Leafs need here, which I get is a little like saying plants need water and sunlight. Obviously, NHL teams need consistent goaltending to win!
On the other side of the coin, Roman Polak was fantastic last night – in the sense that he used to play for the Sharks and played like he still wants to. Martin, Moore and Brown weren’t much better – in fact, they were probably worse. People have been telling me not to care so much about the bottom of the lineup, but that is really where NHL games (especially in a parity filled salary cap league) are won. What is frustrating is that the Toronto Maple Leafs have a potentially great set of players they could plug into these spots, but for whatever reason are resisting the obvious move, which is to make the entire team fast, young and talented while eschewing everyone who can’t skate, score or make a pass.
stats from naturalstattrick.com