The Toronto Maple Leafs have won three of their last four games after a pretty embarrassing loss in Edmonton.
The Toronto Maple Leafs might have dropped the ball in that game, but they certainly rebounded with a nice performance Saturday night against those same Oilers.
This comes post a fairly successful deadline in which most of their focus went to really strengthening their back end and acquiring mostly defensive forwards.
All three games had a distinct playoff feel, as teams are entering the stretch battling for playoff positioning and in the case of Oilers and Flames making the playoffs in the first place.
As the games get tighter we are starting to reap the results of Leafs new defensive strategy in action.
The Toronto Maple Leafs Can Play Any Style of Game
The Toronto Maple Leafs routed the high flying Oilers last night in a high scoring bout where their offensive talent was on full display.
New acquisition Noel Acciari came out flying with the opening marker before the big boys took over the game. They went on to out score the league’s best and bailed out their goaltender, who let in some of the worst goals I’ve seen this season, in the process.
They beat the Calgary flames in a low event grind-y 1 goal game.
The Leafs battled a very physical and chippy Flames team and asserted themselves not only on the score board but in the corners as well. Largely due to many of their new additions, with the stand out being Jake McCabe
They beat the devils in a tight back and forth where both teams flexed their capabilities in a fairly even matchup.
Yet again the Leafs were able to come out on top with a gutsy victory in the absence of Ryan O’Reilly and Tavares whose injuries sidelined them for the game.
However a fantastic play by newcomer Sam Lafferty, having to play second line center due to the aforementioned injuries, again opened up the scoring and got the Leafs into the game
All three wins have been come from behind victories where the Leafs have shown their resilience and all three games contain some great goals chipped in by their bottom six and depth players.
Their new acquisitions are fitting in nicely and the Leafs are showing they can play any sort of game their opponent wants. They can take control of those games and shut the door on their opponents.