I wonder if any of the reporters give Babcock a grilling on his ice time distribution. It was evident pretty early on that Gardiner was struggling and Dermott was playing well yet Gardner ends up playing 24 minutes to 11 for Dermott.
Kapanen scored an amazing shorty and be played under 9 minutes??? Like c'mon some of this is on the coach for not managing his team in game
The kids from the Marlies were nice-to-haves; I agree they're generally the better option, but the coach has gone through the entire season leaning on his prime players to pretty good effect and you sort of have to bank on that. I'd like Babcock to be faster on the uptake, but that's just how I see it.
I thought Kapanen and Johnsson should've been up with the Leafs last year instead of Matt Martin and whoever so that they'd be ready to be relied upon this year, but there's also their confidence and developmental readiness to account for. Johnsson said he appreciated the extra time they afforded him with the Marlies, rather than calling him up to be the franchise saviour and yo-yoing him when he inevitably faltered a bit.
Let's note, at this point, that the real back-breaker in that series -- and in game 7 particularly -- was one Jake DeBrusk. A 21 year old rookie who average 15 min/game during the series.
I know you've all been waiting for my opinion, so wait no more:
1. You play your best players when the game is on the line. They're the ones that have earned it all year, and you count on them to get up. DeBrusk is one of Boston's best forwards, he's a second line player that plays those minutes. The Leafs also have players his age, and younger, that played a lot more the DeBrusk did/does.
2. I think the Kadri suspension is where this series got decided. That suspension really hurt the lineup.
3. The Leafs counted on Andersen far too many times this year, and their luck ran out there.
4. Gardiner had a bad game, oh well. He's a 50 point defenseman this year, and one of the key guys that got this team into the playoffs. If the Leafs could replay that period, I'm pretty sure they'd play Gardiner again in those minutes.
5. I don't consider last night's game to be indicative of anything in particular, I'm more trying to look at the series overall. The 7 game series did show me that Matthews and Nylander have a fair bit of work to do to earn $10-$11 mil and $6-$7 mil on my Leafs team. Marner and Marleau played well. The newer kids played pretty darn well, all things considered.
6. Young team, didn't get it done, not really surprised. I'm looking forward to an interesting off-season.