Maple Leafs Lack of “Execution” Getting Tiresome as They Fall to Kings
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The Maple Leafs are on a season-high three-game losing streak as the high-octane offense-driving club hits a complete stall.
LOS ANGELES — When the Toronto Maple Leafs opened their season with a loss to the lowly Montreal Canadiens and followed that up with losses against Arizona Coyotes, Vegas Golden Knights and San Jose Sharks, Sheldon Keefe appeared to be the sole point of public frustration over the club’s effort.
The coach called his team’s performance against Montreal, He walked back comments about his comments about elite players following the loss to Arizona. But now that his club dropped their third consecutive game — a 4-2 loss to the Los Angeles Kings — it’s clear that frustration has seeped into the players.
“We win and lose as a team and everyone’s got to be a lot better, including myself,” Maple Leafs captain John Tavares said.
The team leader helped kick off Toronto’s scoring with a power-play goal on Saturday. It was his team-leading fourth tally that gave the Maple Leafs a 1-0 lead after 20 minutes and his improved play has been an anomaly for a team that has had their stars come up dry.
Outside of Toronto’s goal, their first period was a statistical nightmare. The club’s top two lines combined for an expected-goals rate of just 3.5 percent.
When Toronto’s even-strength play began to even out in the second period, their penalty kill let them down.
Justin Holl, who has had a miserable season to date, was in the penalty box for two Kings power-play goals. Later in the frame, he and teammate Morgan Rielly got crossed up in their own zone, leading to Gabriel Vilardi’s tally that made it 3-1 and stood up to be the game-winner.
“He’s fine,” Rielly said of the embattled Holl. “He’s a great player for us and he has been for a long time. “He’s a big part of our back end, he plays good minutes for us. So, there’s really no concern there.”
When the defense hasn’t been there, the Maple Leafs have traditionally been able to score their way out of these issues. But that hasn’t happened this season.
Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner and Tavares each led the Leafs with four shots on goal on Saturday, with Tavares’ power-play tally the only one to hit the back of the net.
Matthews has a career-worst two goals in nine games to start the season. Marner also has just two goals.
With Toronto’s core players mostly staying the same, it’s conceivable that the rest of the league has begun to identify things to stop Toronto’s offense dead in its tracks.
“I do know when a team has a strength like that for multiple seasons in a row, teams will start to key on things and it becomes more difficult,” Rielly said. “For us it’s just keeping the confidence, keeping the positivity and just continuing to work.”
Keefe was quick to put all the emphasis on his team not burying their chances.
“Our guys are used to playing through that so it’s no excuse,” Keefe said. “That’s not a reason why we should be going through what we’re going through here. We’ve got to find our way through that.”
Right now, “execution” has been identified as the issue with the Toronto Maple Leafs. There aren’t any answers and that is growing a bit tiresome as the team falls to 4-4-1 this season.
The reshuffled bottom six
Although the top two lines failed to drive offense, Pierre Engvall broke through for his first goal of the season. It came at an important time when his team was down 3-1 late in the second period and should have helped Toronto grab momentum going into the third.
The line of Engvall, David Kampf and Nicholas Aube-Kubel (who played in his first game in nine days after serving as a healthy scratch) was Toronto’s best line with an expected-goals rate of 69 percent.
Nick Robertson, playing in his first game in his hometown, didn’t see a lot of action. The fourth line was limited to just 4:49 and had a team-worst expected-goals rate of 23 per cent.
Kral debuts
Filip Kral made his NHL debut and finished with a +1. If the Leafs were looking to change things up. Perhaps giving Holl a game to rest and inserting Victor Mete may do the trick.