Toronto Maple Leafs vs Blue Jackets 5v5 Analysis

The Toronto Maple Leafs and Columbus Blue Jackets will finally get under way today.

The 5v5 game state is the most important out of any and the Toronto Maple Leafs and Columbus Blue Jackets will likely spend plenty of time playing at 5v5 given both teams don’t take too many penalties.

As many are likely well aware, the Leafs and Blue Jackets are polar opposites of each other. The Leafs are great at offense but poor a defense. The Blue Jackets are bad at offense but great at defense.

Let’s dig into the big picture 5v5 numbers for both teams.

What we will look at is the percentage of expected goals(xGF%), shot attempts (CF%), and the goals for (GF%).

Any team above 50% is effective overall if you have more scoring chances, shots, and goals you’re doing a good job.

Thus let’s get to the numbers:

Columbus Blue Jackets:
51.66xGF%

48.87CF%

50.55GF%

Toronto Maple Leafs:
51.62xGF%

52.28CF%

50.29GF%

All data from Evolving Hockey 

As you may have noticed both teams are basically neck in neck in when it comes to these numbers overall. This is especially the case when it comes to xGF%.

I tend to put more weight into the xGF% since it gives us data based on shot location, and there is enough happening over 70 games that the correlation is likely strong. And if I were to use only GF%, this would be flawed since it is not very replicable and highly influenced by S% and Sv%.

Teams generally don’t end up this tight in numbers but here we are. And the more interesting part is that both teams have put up these results in completely separate ways.

Let’s break down each team’s strengths and weaknesses at 5v5 and what they did to get to these numbers.

Toronto Maple Leafs 5v5

With the likes of the Leafs offensive talented players, they were able to thrive on a formula that generates waves of high danger chances, places emphasis on offensive zone puck possession, and finishes on their chances more often than other teams.

At even-strength, the Leafs generated expected goals at the 4th best rate in the NHL with 2.61xGF/60, goals for 6th best in the NHL with 2.74GF/60, and shot attempts 4th best in the NHL with 60.40CF/60.

These numbers were even stronger if you take away the period before Keefe was put in charge of the bench.

What is clear is that the Leafs are at the top of the league in every offensive category we have to date, and it is no mistake because the Leafs are as good as anyone in the league at scoring goals.

With the offensive talent that the Leafs have there is no team better than them at scoring goals, it is their forte.

If you are really interested in learning more about the Leafs best player, I recommend this video here. It goes further in-depth as to why Matthews is the sole best 5v5 goal scorer in the league.

I like to point to this game here against the Hurricanes earlier in the season that shows what the Leafs have to offer (and this goes for the defense as well which we will cover)

Now that we have got that over with we have to move on to the Leafs widely known weakness, their defensive game.

Just in that wild game against Carolina, the team allowed 6 goals against.

To get a more clear perspective, let’s take a look at the defensive numbers the same way we did with the offensive numbers.

At 5v5 the Leafs defensive numbers are as follows. The Toronto Maple Leafs are 18th in expected goals against with 2.45xGA/60, 27th in goals against with 2.74GA/60, and 14th in shot attempts against with 55.14CA/60.

As you can tell unsurprisingly these numbers are not ideal in any manner for a team competing for the Stanley Cup.

The Toronto Maple Leafs as an entire group tend to struggle in their own end besides a few select players. As plenty of their players have gotten better over the years at defending (Matthews), there is still a lot of work to be done.

I tend to point to core players such a Tavares or Rielly who are excellent offensively but tend to falter on the defensive side of things. Both seem to represent the teams’ identity well.

If this were NHL the video game, most of the Leafs players would have really low defensive awareness but high offensive awareness.

Columbus Blue Jackets 5v5

Losing hart trophy candidate Artemi Panarin is a loss that no team would be able to come out the same.

John Tortorella and the Blue Jackets had to fully revamp the playstyle and opt for a heavily defensive game because the scoring talent is not there anymore. Tortorella and the roster deserve plenty of credit for what they have been able to accomplish this season.

With Panarin departing, among others, the Blue Jackets only have a few players who are able to contribute offense at an efficient level.

Most of their players strictly bring a defensive presence. A prime example of this is Riley Nash who is one of the best bottom-6 defensive centers but can only contribute offense at a level of Frederik Gauthier.

Nevertheless, let’s dig into the Blue Jackets offensive numbers.

The Blue Jackets sit 28th in expected goals for with 2.22xGF/60, 28th in GF/60 with 2.14GF/60, and 24th in shot attempts for with 53.63CF/60.

Again, clearly the Blue Jackets seem to struggle as a whole on the offensive side of things. The players have a hard time getting shots off from the high danger area and rarely get chances off the rush.

The Blue Jackets defensemen tend to take more shots than the forwards at times which is problematic since the defensemen are shooting from farther away.

In every situation, defensemen will always end up with a lower S% than forwards in the long run solely due to the shot locations. This is why Morgan Rielly is extremely unlikely to get another 20 goal season ever again, a lot of his goals were luck-based and unsustainable.

Now let’s move on to the Blue Jackets’ main strength, defense.

The Blue Jackets sit 3rd in expected goals against with 2.08xGA/60, 5th in goals against with 2.09GA/60, and 18th in shot attempts against with 56.11CA/60.

Clearly, this shows that the Blue Jackets are the best of the best at limiting the opponent from getting anywhere near the net.

It’s almost as if the Blue Jackets goaltenders have been social distancing from the opposing players, because, against the Blue Jackets, attacking players rarely get within 6 feet of the goaltender.

If I were a coach I would be using clips of the blue jackets to show my team how they are able to keep the attacking players to the outside of the ice.

However, it is more than just keep other teams to the outside, the whole attitude and strategy for the Blue Jackets is built upon a full defensive buy-in.

Seth Jones put it well in an interview earlier in the season:

 ”It’s just buying into how we play the game and being mentally sharp. We pride ourselves in not cheating on that side of the puck in searching for offense or in giving up plays defensively around our net for the sake of playing offense.”

The defense-first attitude is what separates the Blue Jackets from an average defensive team, they truly strive to play low event hockey.

Jack Han now of The Athletic broke down how the Blue Jackets breakout is centered around focusing strictly on flooding the strong side of the ice to have options for short chips up the ice or one-two passing plays.

The reason they use this strategy is to reduce the chances of a costly turnover occurring in the neutral zone. But the limited amount of space on one side of the ice limits the chances of creating rush chances and breakaways.

The reason for this breakout style is to limit offense against.

A tactic such as their breakout goes to show the team’s number one goal isn’t to generate offense, it’s to prevent goals against. The Blue Jackets will put defense first in every way possible.

I even embarked on how they get caught having this attitude on the powerplay here.

Furthermore, let’s take a look at more of the common strategies employed by both teams

Key Approaches To Each Teams 5v5 Game

Forechecking

After explaining how well the teams are both offensively and defensively at 5v5, there are a couple of key elements to the way both teams blueprint will work going into this series.

After both losses to the Bruins in 2018 and 2019, it is clear that the Bruins targeted the Toronto Maple Leafs weaker right defensemen on the forecheck hard, and ended up having plenty of success in doing so.

Just like the Bruins, the Blue Jackets are a team that has a heavy forecheck. The Blue Jackets have the second most scoring chances off the forecheck, and the most goals off the forecheck.

Because the Blue Jackets don’t have the offensive skill of other teams, they rely on waiting for the other team to make mistakes with the puck to pounce on and score on. They are unlike the Leafs who create opportunities for themselves, the Blue Jackets make the opponent create opportunities for them.

The Blue Jackets don’t score often but when they do it’s generally off the cycle or off the forecheck.

With the Toronto maple Leafs defensemen being notorious at giving up pucks in their own end, and the Leafs as a whole being among the worst teams at stopping the cycle.

This is something the Blue Jackets may be able to take full advantage of as the Blue Jackets are among the best at scoring off the cycle.

With that being said, under Sheldon Keefe, the Leafs have employed a few different and intriguing breakout strategies and seem to be better than ever before at exiting the zone with control.

The organization has put major emphasis on helping players learn to exit the zone effectively.

The Leafs are the close to the best in the business at exiting the zone with possession only trailing behind the Avalanche in this category.

With the speed and skill of the Leafs players, Sheldon Keefe has emphasized changing sides and creating as much movement as possible to open up space on the ice for either short breakout passes or even now some use of stretch passes seem to be back in the fold.

Although the way the Leafs breakout the puck is riskier than other methods, it is extremely effective and rewarding when done properly.

With the diversity on the breakout, it will be hard for the Blue Jackets to game plan against it, and any team as a matter of fact.

Blocking Shots

Blocking shots has been a key strategy for the Blue Jackets, as they block a higher percentage of shots than any other team.

With the defensive attitude the Blue Jackets generate, it is no surprise they block a large number of shots since they are able to keep other teams to the outside so effectively.

With the Leafs high octane offense it will be hard to keep the Leafs shooters without getting shots on net but I am confident the Blue Jackets won’t make it easy on the Leafs.

Almost every Blue Jackets player is competent defensively but there are some that have minor weaknesses that may not be able to keep up with the talent the Leafs have to offer.

Some of my favorite writers in the hockey world have written about how Jones is overrated pointed out exactly why. here, here and here.

With little missteps from players every once in a while which will happen more often against the Toronto Maple Leafs than not, the Blue Jackets don’t have a perfect defense.

The third clip in this video exemplifies what I am expressing, Marner completely toys with Werenski. If Marner is able to do this consistently throughout the series, the Blue Jackets may have some trouble.

Those were two keys to the games that I thought were important to point out, now I think it’s important to check out how the players match up against each other.

Defensive Matchup

The Blue Jackets seem to be known for their “high-end” defensemen more than anything. The two players as you may guess I’m referring to are Seth Jones and Zach Werenski.

But I tend to look at the Blue Jackets defensive corps and believe that the difference makers are the other 4 defensemen on the roster.

Both Jones and Werenski seem to be massively overrated while the rest of the team seems to be underrated.

I have outlined some points made earlier and some articles that talk about Jones being very overrated as a player. I think this goes for Werenski as well, he seems to be like a poor mans Rielly in terms of poor defending and less offensive ability.

I am not saying both Jones and Werenski are bottom pair defenders, I just think they are overhyped in a sense and are closer to second pair defenders. As Jack Han has pointed out the Toronto Maple Leafs offense might be able to take advantage of the missteps in this defensive pairing.

With this being said, the Jones-Werenski pairing will likely get more offensive matchups than defensive matchups but they will still be played in any situation. Tortorella relies heavily on these two and they will spend plenty of time against the Leafs top-6 forwards.

As far as the second pair goes, David Savard and Vladislav Gavrikov are a great shutdown pair as both players have elite-level defensive numbers. I sure think they will be a hard matchup for any of the Leafs forwards, and any of the league forwards as a whole.

The Savard-Gavrikov pairing has been able to get such impressive results against top competition, even with a lower quality of teammates.

Though like much of the Blue Jackets roster, the second pairing doesn’t handle offense at a very high level. Any Leaf defensive pairing is far better at generating offense.

But neither of the Toronto Maple Leafs pairings can match the defensive tier of this pairing, and as a matter of fact, few defensive pairings in the entire NHL can.

On the bottom-pair is staple Ryan Murray and Dean Kukan. Both have been an excellent third pair and I’m quite positive that this would be an effective second pair on most teams. This goes to show that the Blue Jackets are abundant in defensive depth.

Even with an overwhelming amount of injuries throughout the season, the defensemen rarely struggled is truly impressive.

The Blue Jackets defensemen are a solid group all around, and although a few guys may be overrated, the other players are probably underrated so it makes up for the matter.

The Blue Jackets defensemen will have their hardest test yet, and it will be interesting to see if they can handle the Leafs heavily powered offense.

Conclusion

With the Toronto Maple Leafs heavy powered offensive ability, I think it will be hard for any team to not have trouble with. On the other hand with the Blue Jackets’ exceptional structure and defensive talent, it will be hard for the Leafs offense to produce the way it generally has.

I know I have been back and forth like crazy, but this is because the series is such a tight one, and the matchup is so close it’s hard to really have full confidence in either team. I wrote a bit about how close the series truly is here.

If this Blue Jackets roster had another top-6 forward I think I would take them in this series quite easily.

With the waves of offense that the Leafs have I can see a point where the Leafs just out talent the Blue Jackets and score more often than they do.

The biggest lineup mismatch to me is the presence of either Jenner or Wennberg on the second line, one of whom will be spending a lot of time against either the Matthews or Tavares line.

I do see the Blue Jackets defensemen having an advantage overall compared to the Leafs defensemen. Although, the Blue Jackets defensemen aren’t perfect in any regard and will have a big task up ahead.

With such a long layoff, it’s hard to really predict who will have the edge. It will be up to who shows up more ready to play.

Every little detail in the game will matter, especially in a 5 game series.

If the Blue Jackets are able to disrupt the Leafs breakout and get the Leafs caught in their own zone, this could go really bad for the Leafs.

On the other hand, if the Blue Jackets fail to adapt to the speed and deceptiveness of the Leafs forwards, the Leafs could easily get hot and sweep.

Getting quality shots will be tough for Toronto, but with the shooting talent and playmaking on the Leafs roster, they have the potential to win by outshooting the Blue Jackets.

This is easily the best series of the qualifying round, I think a lot of people are going to tune into it. Both teams are very strong in their own manner and either could go the distance in my mind.

Whoever shows up first on Sunday will make all the difference in who will come out on top. I expect both coaches to have some tricks up their sleeves, so this will be fascinating to watch play out.