Toronto Maple Leafs: Time to Sit Cody Ceci and Play Rasmus Sandin

SUNRISE, FLORIDA – FEBRUARY 27: Rasmus Sandin #38 of the Toronto Maple Leafs skates with the puck against the Florida Panthers during the second period at BB&T Center on February 27, 2020 in Sunrise, Florida. (Photo by Michael Reaves/Getty Images)

The Toronto Maple Leafs lost game one of their play-in series, and game two goes today at 4PM.

In game one of the Toronto Maple Leafs vs Columbus Blue Jackets best-of-five series one thing was apparent:

Cody Ceci is not an NHL quality defenseman. 

The Leafs have to make a change before tonight’s game and that change is pretty obvious: they must swap out the brutal Cody Ceci for the extremely talented Rasmus Sandin.

Sandin and Ceci

Regardless of how bad Ceci is – and we’ll get to that – the Leafs simply cannot leave a player as talented as Sandin on the bench.

It’s just pure hubris – you can’t expect to win if one of your best players isn’t playing.

And make no mistake, from a talent perspective, Sandin is one of their best players.  He only lacks NHL experience, something the team should be looking to get for him right now.

The Toronto Maple Leafs were gifted Rasmus Sandin in the late first round two years ago, and after watching the success of 19 year olds Quinn Hughes and Cale Makar, you’d think the Leafs would want to dress Sandin.

It’s not guaranteed, but it’s also not impossible that one year from today the Leafs best defenseman is Rasmus Sandin.

His career potential is top pairing superstar, and the fact that he’s on the bench in favor of Ceci is mindblowing.

In game one, Sheldon Keefe limited Ceci’s ice time to just 16:28 5v5 minutes.  That was fifth out of six on the Leafs blue-line (Travis Dermott played the least, but he had a great game and should play more).

Ceci’s performance was terrible: when he was on the ice, Toronto got 12 shot-attempts and allowed 23, good for a brutal 32% Corsi. Considering that the Leafs and Columbus finished the game tied at 50%, it is obvious that Columbus had most of their success when Ceci was on the ice.

Sandin is a rookie, but he couldn’t possibly do worse, and his ceiling is infinitely higher. (All stats naturalstattrick.com).

The Leafs led in overall scoring chances, but when Ceci was on the ice they were outchanced 11-4.   And I’ll give you one guess on who was on the ice for the one goal against.

The Toronto Maple Leafs had quite a bit of trouble breaking through the neutral zone trap, and Sandin will help them there, as he is an excellent puck carrier and passer.

Ceci offers no help there, or anywhere.  It’s frankly shocking that the Toronto Maple Leafs have Cody Ceci on their roster, as they are a team heavily advertised as an “Analytics Team” and Ceci’s analytics are brutal.

If the Leafs want to win this series, it’s time to bench Ceci.