J
Jalili
Guest
As much as I want to say that the focus should be on the team's poor play and not on officiating... the officiating was absolutely atrocious.
Leafs @ Penguins - Nov. 27th, 7:30pm - TSN, SN 590
- Thread starter CarltonTheBear
- Start date
crazyperfectdevil
New member
Snoopzilla said:
it was..but again..the leafs deserved what they got ...unless the officials told the leafs that there wouldn't be a third period
bustaheims
Active member
Snoopzilla said:
Yeah. I'm not blaming the officials for the loss. They're not the reason the Leafs couldn't get a shot on net after the 2nd period. However, poor officiating is poor officiating, and it deserves to be called out, regardless of how the game plays out.
bustaheims said:
The penalty was called by the referee at centre ice, not by the one in the zone that would have gotten to Kadri first. That's going to happen with a two-referee system.
Andy007
Active member
So can someone explain how Ranger is a better option than Gardiner and how Liles isn't good enough to be a #7 defenceman? I don't see the point of having slower, bigger defencemen who rarely use their size or clear guys from the net. It's like having a fighter on the 4th line every game playing less than 5 minutes and not fighting.
I also love that McLement/Kulemin were the 2nd group of forwards out in Overtime. Because that's what the Leafs need to win the game, one guy with one point and another with 1 goal in the last 30 games.
Of course that's just a minor criticism of what was an absolute mess of a game. You can talk all you want about the level of talent on Pittsburgh top 6 but it doesn't explain how Toronto literally cannot break out of their own zone. I thought defencemen pinching was supposed to be risky; every team's defence pinches against Toronto and still Toronto cannot figure out how to exploit that. I seriously think that with Raycroft/Toskala level goaltending that they'd have no more than 2 or 3 wins. And that might be generous.
I also love that McLement/Kulemin were the 2nd group of forwards out in Overtime. Because that's what the Leafs need to win the game, one guy with one point and another with 1 goal in the last 30 games.
Of course that's just a minor criticism of what was an absolute mess of a game. You can talk all you want about the level of talent on Pittsburgh top 6 but it doesn't explain how Toronto literally cannot break out of their own zone. I thought defencemen pinching was supposed to be risky; every team's defence pinches against Toronto and still Toronto cannot figure out how to exploit that. I seriously think that with Raycroft/Toskala level goaltending that they'd have no more than 2 or 3 wins. And that might be generous.
I think it might be time to split up the top defence pairing and see what happens. Go with:
Gardiner-Phaneuf
Gunnarsson-Rielly
Fraser/Ranger-Franson
edit: While I'm at it, have we called up Leivo yet?
JVR-Bozak-Kessel
Leivo-Kadri-Kulemin
Raymond-Smith-Clarkson
Smithson-McClement-Orr
Gardiner-Phaneuf
Gunnarsson-Rielly
Fraser/Ranger-Franson
edit: While I'm at it, have we called up Leivo yet?
JVR-Bozak-Kessel
Leivo-Kadri-Kulemin
Raymond-Smith-Clarkson
Smithson-McClement-Orr
Britishbulldog
Active member
crazyperfectdevil said:
Trying to watch the game as un-biased as possible I felt that the officiating was bad. I haven't had chance to read this thread but the Smithson call was pretty weak and Orpik did the exact same thing out by the blue line in overtime except that Orpik didn't even have a stick and didn't get called. I also thought that Letang had JVR's stick under his arm to control it (as players do) but JVR got called for hooking to put the Leafs 2 men down.
Also Malkin clearly pushed Bernier into the net with his stick on Bernier's pad before he shot the puck in.
We got one point. Leafs didn't register a shot in the 3rd and overtime which as you allude to isn't the officials fault.
Hopefully next game will gel better for the Leafs.
Britishbulldog
Active member
Andy007 said:
x2 Andy
I was surprised when I got in tonight and my son told me Ranger was in for Gardiner...even though Gardiner had a rough game last time. I wish Liles was up and Ranger was down. Ranger has a NTC not s NMC.
I couldn't figure Carlyle's decisions out either when you have Kadri, JVR, Kessel, Raymond, and even Bozak and Clarkson who have had a nose for the net.
As for being hemmed in, it was almost like some players knew what the coach had them practice and others couldn't remember or were panicked into bad decisions. It was pretty bad.
maplesyrup
New member
LOL... Crashed when it was 4-1. Woke up to this. 
drummond said:
Over 80 games I doubt it. But one thing is for sure, Carlyle's system is not working, or not sinking in, thus his message is falling on deaf ears. that pitt game was like they came out in the third and played a whole dif system. what the coach did or said between periods was wrong.
BlueWhiteBlood
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
I thought it was time to call up Leivo when Lupul went down, so.... yeah, make the call.
The officiating was bad, but not the cause for the loss. The Leafs scored enough goals IMO, it was their inability to shut the Pens down and keep the puck out of our zone that killed them.
I also think Carlyle released the NOS to early and burnt out his top players, killing them in the 3rd. Malkin was all over the net though most of the night with motivation to boot!
Tough loss, but I agree that for the next game, they need to ice better lines, like you have above. The only change I might make, is trying Rielly with Phaneuf and Gunnar with Franson or Gardiner.
BlueWhiteBlood said:
The reason I had it the way I did is because Phaneuf, Rielly, and Franson are the only defencemen who seem comfortable playing the right side. And while Rielly has looked better than I expected, I would still like to see him sheltered a little bit.
GhostofPotvin29
New member
I think last night showed why Gardiner should stay in the lineup. The team struggles to break out of the zone on a good night and Gardiner is one of the best, if not the best, on the team at settling it down to break out.
BlueWhiteBlood
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
I don't disagree with that, certainly for the the left/right reason, but I really want to see what Rielly can do with top minutes beside Phaneuf. I'd worry about him defensively a bit, but I also think he has it in him to step up to meet that challenge.
On a side note; I thought Gardiner would have tightened up his game more by now, it's a bit disappointing. He scares me a lot when he has the puck in the defensive zone.
BlueWhiteBlood said:
It's pretty interesting how opinions on this have differed this season. Gardiner is literally the last defenceman I would be worried about when the puck is on his stick.
BlueWhiteBlood
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
Yeah, but with me it's more about the chances he takes, as opposed to his talent. He is going to be a very good defenceman, but he needs to learn to make the safe play if he does get in trouble. We all know how good he is at moving the puck, but off the glass is still a good play at times.