The Toronto Maple Leafs still haven’t signed William Nylander.
And while we wait for the Toronto Maple Leafs to do that, here are some notes and thoughts from around the NHL.
Speaking of those Leafs, they lost their lead in the Atlantic and the NHL overall standings to the Lightning. The Lightning have a very good team, but with the Bruins also right there, it’s worth pointing out that with three of the best teams in the NHL in a single division, two of them stupidly will have to play each other in the first round.
I think it’s safe to say that none of the three teams stands out as significantly better than the other, and that they are easily the three best teams in the Eastern Conference. What this means is that the first round of the Playoffs is the equivalent difficulty of the best EC Final you could come up with, and likely even the equivalent of the Stanley Cup Final.
Long story short: A Toronto vs Boston or TB first round matchup could easily be the hardest series either team plays if they went on to win the Cup. It’d be a 50/50 proposition to win that series and thus winning the division is extremely important. Which is why they should just get Nylander back into the lineup already.
Anyways, on to the NHL Ruminations. (Not Thoughts!)