Habs @ Leafs - Oct. 8th, 7:00pm - SN, Fan 590
- Thread starter CarltonTheBear
- Start date
L K
Active member
The Kessel-JVR-Bozak line was atrocious defensively outside of the final 5 minutes of the game with a few good rushes. The Subban goal was a comedy of missed assignments and JVR just quitting on the play and leaving Subban all alone.
It seems that Carlyle's approach to the game was to just take minutes away from the 2nd line and give it to the 4th line tonight. That's not a great approach, especially given that part of the reason for playing 4 lines is to take pressure off the top 6, not play the top line a lot (especially in a game where they played poorly).
The Leafs are much faster than last year which is good. I'm not sure if they are as fast as two years ago though, something just seemed off with the flow of their skating (lack of familiarity perhaps).
The defense was pretty mobile. I found Robidas to be very quiet in a good way. Percy had a pretty fantastic debut and I'm not really going to blame him for having a fluke bounce give Montreal the win back right after the Leafs got a fluke goal to tie it. Rielly and Gardiner were hit and miss. At times their skating and creativity was nice but they pinch in bad situations too.
Polak I liked. He hit a lot but he also took himself out of position a few times doing it and I think that is part of his reputation. He definitely can skate and I didn't really see his lateral mobility as much of a problem against one of the faster teams in the league so that bodes well. All that being said, I'm viewing him as a 3rd pairing defenseman and not a guy who is playing on the 2nd pairing. He got beat a few times to the outside because he was slow to react to the play.
Phaneuf I found to be fairly disappointing. He got beat wide on the 1st Montreal goal and I found him to be pretty slow in general. He wasn't bad, but it was another game where the captain/#1 defenseman wasn't our best player on the back end and I find that happens too much. I'm just really not a huge fan of his game.
Bernier had an ok game. That first goal was brutal. I can't really fault him on the other goals although I think he should have been more aggressive to get around the screen on the Subban goal. I thought Price was the better of the two goalies tonight. The Leafs had a few glorious chances in the 1st to open up a lead and he shut them down. Bernier bailed out some very questionable defense in the 2nd and 3rd periods.
Montreal "solved" the Leafs defensive approach after the 1st intermission. They started doing the lob pass/dump through the neutral zone and the Leafs were caught flat footed a lot. They still don't defend well along the boards because they try and poke pucks away rather than engaging the forechecker and tying them up. It's great when they get the puck out on the first poke but if not, the puck ends up in the Leafs end for 30-40 seconds while they start chasing it around and lose structure to their play.
Overall, they deserved to lose this one but could have come out with a win too so I'm not going to get too beat up about Game 1 of 82.
It seems that Carlyle's approach to the game was to just take minutes away from the 2nd line and give it to the 4th line tonight. That's not a great approach, especially given that part of the reason for playing 4 lines is to take pressure off the top 6, not play the top line a lot (especially in a game where they played poorly).
The Leafs are much faster than last year which is good. I'm not sure if they are as fast as two years ago though, something just seemed off with the flow of their skating (lack of familiarity perhaps).
The defense was pretty mobile. I found Robidas to be very quiet in a good way. Percy had a pretty fantastic debut and I'm not really going to blame him for having a fluke bounce give Montreal the win back right after the Leafs got a fluke goal to tie it. Rielly and Gardiner were hit and miss. At times their skating and creativity was nice but they pinch in bad situations too.
Polak I liked. He hit a lot but he also took himself out of position a few times doing it and I think that is part of his reputation. He definitely can skate and I didn't really see his lateral mobility as much of a problem against one of the faster teams in the league so that bodes well. All that being said, I'm viewing him as a 3rd pairing defenseman and not a guy who is playing on the 2nd pairing. He got beat a few times to the outside because he was slow to react to the play.
Phaneuf I found to be fairly disappointing. He got beat wide on the 1st Montreal goal and I found him to be pretty slow in general. He wasn't bad, but it was another game where the captain/#1 defenseman wasn't our best player on the back end and I find that happens too much. I'm just really not a huge fan of his game.
Bernier had an ok game. That first goal was brutal. I can't really fault him on the other goals although I think he should have been more aggressive to get around the screen on the Subban goal. I thought Price was the better of the two goalies tonight. The Leafs had a few glorious chances in the 1st to open up a lead and he shut them down. Bernier bailed out some very questionable defense in the 2nd and 3rd periods.
Montreal "solved" the Leafs defensive approach after the 1st intermission. They started doing the lob pass/dump through the neutral zone and the Leafs were caught flat footed a lot. They still don't defend well along the boards because they try and poke pucks away rather than engaging the forechecker and tying them up. It's great when they get the puck out on the first poke but if not, the puck ends up in the Leafs end for 30-40 seconds while they start chasing it around and lose structure to their play.
Overall, they deserved to lose this one but could have come out with a win too so I'm not going to get too beat up about Game 1 of 82.
L K said:
The top line was probably actually the worst of the 4 tonight, in both ends of the ice really.
GhostofPotvin29
New member
L K said:
See I disagree that he was 'beat' on this play - probably 99 times out of 100 Bernier makes that save. Did Phaneuf completely stop Pacioretty? No - but neither did Pacioretty completely get by Phaneuf. Phaneuf knocked him outside to the point he was skating along the goal line and had a terrible angle. I don't have a problem with a play like that, neither player got what they wanted, Bernier just let in a weak goal on a shot from a poor spot.
L K
Active member
Potvin29 said:
Beat is maybe a little unfair but he allowed Pacioretty to cut back in toward the net rather than keeping with him and edging him out of a shooting attempt. It was a low percentage shot that should have been stopped so I'm not blaming him for the goal, but that's a play where I would like to see Phaneuf stay with the player and not just be content to have him prevented from cutting into the middle of the zone. A 3rd pairing guy, sure. But Phaneuf should be able to take Pacioretty completely out of the play there and not just drive him wide and then let him be.
leafplasma
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
Well Bozak and Kessel missing the last part of preseason didn't help and they still could be hurt. Clarkson was a bit tentative out there as well for the same reasons. I do really wish the Kadri line would have played more minutes as I thought they were fantastic in the opening period. I am all for rolling 4 lines but I didn't get the robbing of 2nd line minutes to allow it to happen. May just be a learning curve for RC.
GhostofPotvin29
New member
L K said:
Even the top D get beat sometimes when facing off against high end offensive talent. Since I don't think he was beat or that Pacioretty got to where he was trying to go, I'm okay with that play happening again as I think, on percentages, it's rarely going to be a goal against. I think Phaneuf is held to an impossible standard though - I've rarely seen a goal against where he is involved in the play where he isn't harshly ripped for it, despite it being something that every defenseman will have happen many times in a season. I don't think the guy is able to make mistakes, he's held to this odd standard of being ripped on always but being expected to never make errors. Obviously he makes errors, but I don't think 99% of fans watch enough of other great D-men around the league to accurately judge whether it is significantly more errors than them or not. Then you get into contextual issues like quality of partners, etc. I'm rambling...
I don't think he can ever avoid it here, it's endless. But oh well, we just see the play differently.
Craig Button makes a good case that some of Phaneuf's struggles tonight could have been because he was playing the left side for basically the first time of his hockey career:
http://www.tsn.ca/video/th2n-phaneuf-has-shaky-debut-on-the-left-side-1.102644
http://www.tsn.ca/video/th2n-phaneuf-has-shaky-debut-on-the-left-side-1.102644
Heroic Shrimp
New member
L K said:
I bet it's really going to get in their heads when the camera is on their heads. I can't see any way they don't call the game at least a little bit differently and cautiously. Some refs will probably handle it better than others.
bustaheims
Active member
I'm not going to make any sort of final judgements based off one game, but, I definitely saw a lot of the systemic issues from last season come into play again tonight. The 3rd goal specifically seemed a textbook example of why the swarm doesn't work. 5 guys down low on one side of the ice. Subban was all alone with tons of space to play with. Can't let that happen. Too much time in the 2nd period stuck in their own end, unable to get the puck. Some brights spots in terms of the kids, some of the new guys, and the 4th line getting legit ice time, but, overall, still a long way to go before we can really say they're completely on the right track.
hockeyfan1
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
It looked more like they were tired after having played the most minutes of any of the other lines. If this is the trend, again this year, it doesn't bode well for this team's advancement.
hockeyfan1
New member
Thought Bernier looked out of sync somewhat on some of the opposition goals, particularly the first one. Not going to blame the loss on him, not at all, besides, Carey Price wasn't necessarily sharper neither.
Two freaky goals, one for both teams, a back-and-forth skating game, made for good entertainment.
Two freaky goals, one for both teams, a back-and-forth skating game, made for good entertainment.
hockeyfan1 said:
Well last night game did not give me any fuzzy feelings. More of the same.
Kozun had a lot of jump, and played well with Lups and Kadri.
Percy game was more then I expected. I think they played him a bit too much.
The Clarkson line played a good game.
Penalty killing was good, but the 4 min PP lost the us the game IMO.
Bernier was mediocre. I think IMO he should of had the first two goals. I fully expect Reimer to start the next game.
I honestly thought there would be more hitting and fighting for the puck.
Impressed by the speed of this team.
Percy did very well in his first game....bad luck on the gwg.
Kozun....I hope he can come play in this league for an extended period of time....time will tell.
Polak and robidas were steady.
I don't think rielly and Gardiner should be playing together. There talents are better separated. Gardiner should play with Polak to allow him more freedom to rover around.
Percy did very well in his first game....bad luck on the gwg.
Kozun....I hope he can come play in this league for an extended period of time....time will tell.
Polak and robidas were steady.
I don't think rielly and Gardiner should be playing together. There talents are better separated. Gardiner should play with Polak to allow him more freedom to rover around.
