Toronto Maple Leafs: This Is the William Nylander We’ve Been Waiting For

The Toronto Maple Leafs fell to the Washington Capitals last night by a score of 3-2.

The Toronto Maple Leafs have now lost three games in a row, but you can’t be too concerned about it since they lost to St. Louis in O.T and last night’s game was  a good effort with a bad result.

Good teams lose hockey games, and even though it’s typical for their to be a massive over-reaction whenever the Leafs go on a losing streak, there’s really no need to be upset right now.

The Leafs aren’t dominating games like maybe they should be, but I just don’t see the point in being upset about a three-game stretch where they easily could have won two of the games.

Especially when there was so much to like about last night’s game.

Leafs vs Washington

Except for those whose minds are closed off and made up, the William Nylander of the last ten games or so has been a revaluation

Last night, playing centre in place of the concussed Nazem Kadri, Nylander was by far the Leafs best player.  He was on the ice for one goal against and zero for, but he buzzed the net all night, controlled the puck whenever he was on, and basically took over the game in the way that only super-stars can.

The Leafs controlled the puck for 75% of the time Nylander was on the ice, which is crazy.  They outshot the Capitals 12-2 when he was on, and it’s not his fault one of the two shots he allowed went into the Leafs net.

In the last ten games, Nylander has a 59% CF and has been absolutely dominant – unfortunately his on-ice shooting percentage is still around 7% and he continues to get unlucky and he only has five points during this span. (Stats from naturalstattrick.com).

He might only have three goals on the year, but he’s shooting 5% and once that goes back to normal, the Leafs will have themselves a player who is roughly as good as Mitch Marner at 5v5.  Not too bad for a guy half the fan base wants to see on waivers.

Not only was last night’s game one in which the Leafs will usually win, but Babcock had himself a game too – in order here is how he played his defenseman:

Reilly, Gardiner, Muzzin, Dermott, Hainsey, Zaitsev.  To be honest, I’m happier about that than I would be about a win.  The top three combined for over 60 minutes and with one top pairing defenseman on the ice at all times, the Leafs will be close to unstoppable.  We haven’t even begun to scratch the surface of how awesome the Jake Muzzin acquisition was.

Overall, tough result, good game.