Toronto Maple Leafs: 3 Takeaways from a Dominant 6-2 Win

The Toronto Maple Leafs are a high scoring team, but their underrated defense and goaltending proved to be a game-changer in a resounding win last night vs one of the NHL’s best teams.

The Toronto Maple Leafs put on a clinic against the Lightning in all facets of the game: offense, defense, goaltending, and positioning were all close to perfection.

Their coverage on the Lightning’s breakout plays stifled any pressure Brayden Point and Nikita Kucherov attempted to place on the defense.

Their breakout plays, however, proved to cause fits for the Lightning the whole night.

Play away from the puck was stellar, getting in the way of shooting and passing lanes, frustrating the Lightning attack.

The Lightning are not a bad team, but the Toronto Maple Leafs made them look mediocre last night. Whether they were off their game or not doesn’t really seem to matter here because the Leafs effectively countered their strategies once the second period began.

With that said, here are my three takeaways.

1. The Toronto Maple Leafs Offense was Dominate

Auston Matthews terrorized the opposition with his shot, speed, passing… Everything.

He is a generational talent, and his ability to take over a game was a huge difference maker for the Leafs. Mitch Marner is amazing with the puck, able to draw three defenders towards him only to make a cross ice pass to Michael Bunting… Which bounced off a skate right to Matthew’s stick.

Marner’s play here is key as the pass would not have gotten through if he didn’t force the Lightning to respect him. The ice completely opened up and Matthews, like all great goal scorers before him, attracted the puck to his stick for snipe.

The main thing that makes their offense dangerous is their transition game. The SECOND the opposition makes a mistake, the Leafs are off to the races. The Lightning had 12 giveaways this game and the Leafs made each one of those seem like a dangerous scoring chance.

The Toronto Maple Leafs also never made it seem like their shot was just flinging it on goal with the hope that it will go in. The Lightning, on the other hand, didn’t really seem to have many moments where their SOG was dangerous. However, that was because of the  Leafs off-puck coverage in their own zone.

2. Defense and Goaltending

The Toronto Maple Leafs are not exactly known for their defense OR goaltending, with Kyle Dubas attempting to acquire Marc-Andre Fleury at the deadline.

However, the Leafs did an amazing job stifling the Lightning by getting in the passing lanes and blocking shots. Something that was major was how they kept the Lightning to the outside, not allowing cross-ice passes. The cycle had nothing as the only available shots came from the point, which was heavily covered.

Even when the SOG did come, the defensemen did a great job in making sure there were minimal second-chance opportunities. One example would be when Mark Giordano followed the man rather than the puck. He showed his experience where the goaltender stopped the puck, but his man was still driving the net. Giordano followed through on his check, eliminating any chance the Lightning had. (stats naturalstattrick.com).

Goaltending was astounding as Jack Campbell managed to beat Vasilevskiy in the goaltending battle. While Vasilevskiy did not necessarily have the most help from his team, Campbell made the stops his team needed to drain the Lightning’s confidence and any kind of momentum they attempted to earn.

The Leafs are starting to be a complete team that plays a system that could be successful in the playoffs. As the team continues to find what makes them successful and that winning isn’t always fun, this team could finally be that Eastern Conference Stanley Cup contender we have been looking for.