Steve Dangle recaps and analyzes Game 41 of the Toronto Maple Leafs season against the New York Islanders
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23 Comments
The Islanders own the Leafs.
Max Domi doesn't get it deep because he's Max Domi. Watch how often he doesn't even get the puck out of the zone when he is 5 feet away, and worse, not only does he not get it deep he then bails for a line change.
I was about to have my own rant at your rant on Rielly because I thought the guy was like 35+ and being asked to do more than he could possibly handle with his age and all the injuries.
Turns out he's 31… So yeah… Nevermind… I fully approve, bro has no excuse.
can someone explain why REHEHEHEHEHEALLY is still playing in the nhl?
Scott Mayfield was -3 and at fault for all 3 goals you scored
There always is a bumbling liability of a defenseman every year. I used to think it was scapegoat syndrome. Now it just feeds into the "they're cursed" machine. To have him locked in with a no-move clause. On a team that traded their 1st round pick to a divisonal rival. AGAIN. Just unreal. Only this team.
Rielly is the new Holl, get em off the line up
Put Morgan on the wing
Schaef also on pace to break Leetch rookie d-man goal record.
Leafs will win enough games to miss the playoffs and McKenna/Stenberg sweepstakes.
woll looks shaky play hildabeast
One hell of a game. On a side note- Barzal passed tavares on the Isles assist list. Crazy game.
I still think a 1 for 1 works, both fans would hate it, I personally think these players would benefit to different coaching systems, Nurse for Reilly. Berube would do a lot more with a wider wingspan player, his cap sucks, a bit younger then MO, I don't like Reilly contract at all. Leafs just get more sturdy on the back end, both players are already feeling the pressure, it be no different for them to jump teams.
He could get there… Probably with a different team.
The difference between the Leafs and the Isles is that the Leafs EARNED their 1st over all pick. The Isles lucked out by jumping up 10 spots by winning the lottery.
Id argue, we dont need Reilly. Things are already tense and awkward… he needs to go
Reilly has one unmatched skill left – randomly icing the puck when he has complete control of the puck and not under pressure. Do they keep that stat????
You think Islander fans boo Tavares badly now, wait until Schaefer signs with the Leafs 😂
Maybe Berube should try Morgan Rielly at Leftwing. What do you think?
As a Rielly fan, I'll be the first to say that he has lost a step the last couple years and does not look good under Berube's system. Part of that is on him, part of it feels on how Berube wants him to play. This game looked bad but I will come to defense for him a little because the stats look worse than what actually transpired.
Of the 4 goals, 2 were not entirely his fault. I believe it was the 2nd or 3rd goal where he was actually boxing out the player in front really well, like the islander player was no where near a tip capable spot. His defense partner at the time was Benoit and he was a fish out of water, very far away from his coverage, who ultimately ended up being the one to score. So yeah, Rielly's on the ice for that one but I don't blame him for it.
Then the OT one, yeah you kind of want Rielly to have coverage there, but again I think this is a bad team read moment. Knies gets to Barzal… but uhhh… should he have gotten to the other option on the 2 on 1? Like this is the problem people have with reading these "fast" plays on odd-man rushes. The player skating backwards has less mobility than the one skating forward – all players skating forward. Thus if the player skating backwards has committed to 1 player, the forward skating defender coming back should go for the other player. Even if Rielly recognized and shifted to the passing player defense in this instance, his gap position would have been horrid because that's not the guy he was going for to cover on the initial odd-man rush. You can blame Rielly but that's a team fault. Rielly needs to be better but like so does the team. Knies was just doing his best and went for the wrong coverage. But this comes back to make Rielly look bad which is where this next goal I think puts the icing on the cake here.
The one where Rielly replaced McCabe on the ice, yeah it's him getting burned but like if you watch Domi was going for the islander player which signified to Rielly to back off and cover the middle. Then basically Domi realized he couldn't match pace (because of course, he was dead tired) and that was the end of that. By that point, Rielly was basically flat footed because he was crossing over to the opposite direction, meaning there was no way he was going to position himself to play the 1 on 1 right (not even sure he could – kid's fast). Bam comes the highlight, the kid blew by him and it looks bad. it tallies up on the score bad and we conclude that Rielly is to blame and is thus bad. I'm not entirely sure you can for that one but I get why people would be upset, especially given the night overall.
Which leaves us with… why? This team sucks at defending the rush and standing up at the line. The only player consistently doing it is McCabe (and did in this game a few) where it looks like it's not normal for how the Leafs want to play D. I'm serious watch it, when McCabe does it, it stands out because no one else on the team is really doing it. Even Benoit or OEL, the opponent is halfway in on the half-wall before they make contact; whereas McCabe is like 3-4 feet in from the blue line (and probably why he has the best defensive metrics). Rielly appears to be giving up the blueline altogether and I don't know why. I don't know if they are telling him to be the first man back to be the puck mover and so he's not defending it well. I don't know if its a lingering injury that's preventing his mobility so he's staying back to have a step. I just don't understand why he's doing something different compared to the other D, all of whom outside of McCabe, aren't exactly fairing much better on rush defense. This feels like how I opened: a combination of how the defensive coaching wants them to play VS how much Rielly has degraded in skill / performance.
Now what options do you have? Well, OEL is having a stellar year but it won't be like that every year. If I was a betting man, I'd almost certainly bet OEL has been doing well to get one last try at an Olympics (that's my belief on the motivation). McCabe is great defensively but not a replacement for Rielly offensively. And you don't have someone else who does what Rielly does. Other teams are not going to give you a young replacement when you're trying to ship Rielly out the door because you don't think he fits anymore. Which leads me to coaching. If our PP has looked better by changing that guy, maybe our D would look better by changing the one operating there too. At this point, it might be ideal to try that before trying to ship out players because you don't really have much else in capital to offer in trade options to get a decent return. Oh and Rielly has a full no trade so like.. he has to be in on the whole thing.
Team overall defensively hasn't been good enough to say that Rielly is the only reason you're losing. That's not an excuse for Rielly, he needs to be much better. But it sheds light into why Berube answered the way he probably did.
Just a week ago u and every leaf fan were hating on Matthews with some wanting him TRADED 😭😭😭 omg u guys are funny to watch….
I looked at the lineup and said "Emil Heineman sounds like a name of someone that would score a goal on the Leafs. I'm gonna put a 2 dollar Steve on it."
It’s a team sport, and the team sucks!