SUNRISE, FLA. – They were staying at an oceanside hotel and some among the group spoke of the restorative value of a dose of sun and sand, but to a man the Maple Leafs characterized their long weekend by the Atlantic seaside as strictly a business trip.
Considering how they turned a 2-0 series lead into a 2-2 series deadlock in their best-of-seven second-round matchup with the Florida Panthers, let’s just say Toronto’s once-bustling playoff-hockey business went bust on the beach. After blowing a pair of two-goal leads before losing Game 3 in overtime, most of the Maple Leafs showed up way late to Sunday’s Game 4. If not for a stellar performance in goal from Joseph Woll, who kept the Leafs in a game in which they were badly out-shot, out-skated and out-chanced, it’s possible the Leafs would have lost in an embarrassing blowout. As it was, the Panthers eked out a 2-0 win that didn’t do justice to the extent of their superiority.
Leafs coach Craig Berube wants his team to play a “north game.” It wasn’t in evidence on Sunday in the sunny south. Good thing for the Leafs that Game 5 is back in pc28on Wednesday.
Then again, given the unbothered way Berube spoke after Sunday’s loss, it’s hard to know what the coach was watching, or if he’s simply opting for delusional positivity over the risk of sounding panicked.
It’s a best two-out-of-three now against the defending Stanley Cup champions and the playoff demons are peeking out of Pandora’s Box.
It’s a best two-out-of-three now against the defending Stanley Cup champions and the playoff demons are peeking out of Pandora’s Box.
“In the end, I really liked our physicality and our compete out there,” Berube said. “I thought most guys were engaged. They were going good.”
Survey 1,000 Leafs-loving observers of Sunday’s game who aren’t blood relatives of the Core Four and it’s safe to say “going good” would not be a popular assessment. On a night Toronto’s lack of discipline kept them short-handed for more than nine minutes, pc28was outshot 37-23, lost the high-danger chance battle by a mile, and watched a largely hapless power play gift Florida higher-quality short-handed scoring chances than the Leafs could muster with the man advantage.
The visitors looked less like the Berube Leafs that won Games 1 and 2 in resilient fashion and more like a re-run of a previous playoff no-show coached by Sheldon Keefe. Mitch Marner didn’t register a shot on goal in either of Games 3 or 4. Team captain Auston Matthews, yet to score in now nine second-round playoff games against the Panthers, didn’t look particularly dangerous after skipping the Game 4 morning skate to rest the mystery ailment that appears to have sapped his scoring knack. By the end of Game 4, Toronto’s promisingly dominant performance in the first period of Game 3 was a distant memory.
And the Panthers, who showed shades of a diminished defending champion earlier in the series, looked like a resurgent force who’d figured things out.
“I thought we didn’t do a good enough job of helping our D and executing coming out of the zone, and (the Panthers) were able to kind of sustain offensive-zone pressure throughout the game,” Matthews said. “I thought there was times where we were better, but I think just consistently, over the 60 minutes, they outworked us and outplayed us in that area.”
That area, and most of the other areas. No matter how you assessed Sunday’s performance, let’s face it: Games 3 and 4 amounted to a missed opportunity for the Leafs. Sergei Bobrovsky, the two-time Vezina Trophy winner, came into Sunday as the second round’s worst-performing goaltender as measured by ’s goals saved above expected. And yet the Leafs didn’t do the necessary work to get to the net and regularly test him Sunday.
With no salary-cap limitations on NHL rosters in the playoffs, the tough guy is back with the
“We need to try and get the puck behind them a little bit more and create a little bit more tension in their zone, and just throw some junk at the net,” Brandon Carlo, the Leafs defenceman, said after Game 4.
Once a goal away from taking a 3-0 stranglehold on the series on Friday night, the Maple Leafs have suddenly reinserted themselves into the underdog role. Maybe that’s where they perform best.
The more generous take came from Matthews: “Both teams took care of home ice.”
Still, it’s the Leafs that are theoretically starved to prove their playoff worthiness, and it was the Panthers who brought the palpable hunger to Sunday’s game. Not that there weren’t bright spots for Toronto. Woll went a long way to eliminating any hand-wringing over the injury-induced absence of Game 1 starter Anthony Stolarz. Matthews Knies continued to supply a rugged explosiveness the Panthers are having a hard time handling. William Nylander had his moments looking dangerous, including a late second-period partial breakaway that could have tied it. But beyond that, it was a struggle.
“They did a good job keeping us on the outside, and (it was) hard getting to the inside,” said Nylander. “(We were) letting their goalie see the puck.”
The Leafs didn’t help themselves, giving Florida four chances on the power play before the first intermission. Blame the refs, sure, but three of the four pc28penalties were easy calls, including a high stick by Max Domi, boarding on Bobby McMann and puck over glass by Oliver Ekman-Larsson. Also mixed in was a borderline hooking call on Knies that didn’t help matters.
“We don’t need to take those,” Berube said. “We’ll be smarter than that.”
Good pc28penalty killing on the first three manpower shortages couldn’t stop the Panthers from cashing in on the fourth, with Carter Verhaeghe tapping one in on the backdoor to make it 1-0. If not for Woll, who thwarted Sam Reinhart on a couple of point-blank chances and was as sharp as he’s been all series, it could have been worse.
Penalties have a tendency of balancing out. But while the Leafs earned three power plays in the second period, Toronto’s five-forward first unit could not take advantage of the whistle. Florida’s short-handed chances, particularly a Reinhart point-blanker that required a quick Woll glove, were better than anything the Leafs could muster with the man advantage.
Mind you, the Leafs had their short-handed moments. Knies had a mid-third-period breakaway with the Leafs a man down. He shot wide.
With the Panthers clinging to a 1-0 lead in the third period’s latter half, a neutral-zone turnover by Nylander cued the rush on which Florida’s Bennett scored the goal that made it 2-0. Bennett used a patient, controlled deke to let traffic pass and let Woll swim out of position before depositing the puck in the net. He looked like a player who’s succeeded in the business of turning important playoff games in his team’s direction more than once. He’s got the Stanley Cup ring to prove it.
As for the Maple Leafs? They’ve still got plenty of time to show they’re acquiring the requisite skills for a long playoff run. But there’s plenty of work to do. Even the ever-positive Berube acknowledged the lineup may require a tweak before Wednesday.
Said the coach: “There’s guys that could do more, for sure, and we’re going to need more out of them.”
That list is long, and starts at the top of the salary chart.
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