The Toronto Maple Leafs have bested the Bruins in 5-on-5 play, but their special teams play will need to be better in game 7.
Coming into the first round of the playoffs, the Toronto Maple Leafs awaited a familiar matchup with the Boston Bruins. In what was profiled as a series of Toronto’s speed and skill versus Boston’s physicality and experience, nearly the opposite storyline has emerged.
The Leafs have been the more physical side, outhitting the Bruins 217-206 in the series, but have been outplayed on special teams.
The Leafs 21.6% power play scored at a reasonable rate, but ranks only 12th out of 16 teams in shot generation this playoffs. For a team with a star-studded power play, the offense from the Leafs power play could be better and should feature their first unit for longer stretches of ice time than they currently see.
Not a single Leaf player is ranked in the top-50 forwards for power play ice time this playoffs. This was also true in this year’s regular season.
However, the real difference maker on special teams has been the Bruins power play success, which has scored on seven of their sixteen opportunities (43.7 PP%). In fact, Boston’s seven power play goals have come in only 27:06 of power play time this series.
Needless to say, a 56.3% penalty kill is unsustainable from the Leafs point of view and it represents a crucial opportunity for improvement in game 7.
The Leafs penalty kill has been visibly docile and far too positionally conservative. While they have often collapsed in an attempt to cover Bergeron in his usual slot position, they need to be more aggressive and skate out to meet the puck-carrier in the defensive zone.
But don’t just take that notion on principle, statistical analyses of past teams have shown consistently that penalty kill aggressiveness pays off and correlates positively with goal differential.
Take a look at Boston’s second power-play goal from game 6 on Sunday. Notice how quickly Nikita Zaitsev collapses, despite having David Pastrnak on his heels following a tough backhanded catch from a point pass.
Failing to capitalize on that opportunity to be aggressive and giving Pastrnak time and space at the dot was a recipe for disaster from the start. Take a look here at how an aggressive penalty kill can effectively take away time and space from the puck carrier.
Notice how much less ice the Calgary defender (Mark Giordano) is willing to concede to the Anaheim player (Jakob Silfverberg) at the dot compared to Zaitsev in the previous clip. As soon as Silfverberg is sent backtracking, the Calgary penalty killers pounce, leading to a shorthanded goal.
The Leafs will need to come out on the penalty kill in Game 7 with a focus on taking away time and space despite being a man down.
The Leafs do have reason to feel positive about their even strength play, having had the most scoring chances of any team these playoffs while outscoring the Bruins 12-11.
Pairing it with a better special teams performance will be the Toronto Maple Leafs’ key to success on Tuesday night, where they will have an opportunity to move on to the second round of the playoffs for the first time since 2004.
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All stats courtesy of naturalstattrick.com and nhl.com