Gameday Preview:  Toronto Maple Leafs vs Detroit Red Wings

Time: Thursday, October 10^th 2018

Toronto : 3-1-0 for 6 points

Detroit: 0-1-2 for 2 points

The Toronto Maple Leafs and the Detroit Red Wings for a Thursday night meeting in Detroit. Toronto comes off back to back road wins in Chicago 7-6 in OT and Dallas 7-4. The first 4 games have shown that almost any defensive problem that the Leafs face they can outscore. It’s also been the Matthews, Marner and Tavares show, the 3 have combined for 24 points in the first 4 games.

While Detroit comes into the game struggling, in the midst of a rebuild it’s looking a lot like the struggle the Leafs dealt with for the first couple of year of the rebuild. In order to make a game out of this Detroit will need to stay out of the penalty box, which could be a task for them. Tied for 30^th in the league in penalty minutes, struggling to stay out of the box.

The big story of this game though will be the goaltending. Andersen is having is typical October struggle with a 3.37 GAA and a .892 SV%. While Howard comes in with two OT loses and holds a .924 SV% and 2.36 GAA.

Top Scorers/Goalie Matchup

Matthews – 10 points (7 goals 3 assists) 52% on Face-offs
Rielly – 10 points (2 goals 8 assists)
Tavares – 6 points (6 goals) 51% on face-offs

Larkin, Nyquist, Cholowski – 3 points (1 goal 2 assists, 1 goal 2 assists, 3 assists)
Bertuzzi – 2 points (2 goals)
Helm – 1 points (1 Goal)

Frederik Andersen
2-1-0 3.37GAA .892SV%

Jimmy Howard
0-0-2 2.36GAA .924SV%

Lineups & Injuries

Toronto:

Kapanen –Matthews – Marleau
Marner – Tavares– Hyman
Lindholm – Kadri – Brown
Ennis – Gauthier – Leivo

Rielly  –  Hainsey
Gardiner – Zaitsev
Dermott – Ozhiganov

Scratches – Marincin, Holl and Johnsson

Injuries:

Goalies :

Frederik Andersen
Garrett Sparks

Detroit:

Abdelkader – Larkin – Mantha
Nyquist – Anathansiou – Vanek
Bertuzzi – Neilsen – Rasmussen
Helm – Ehn – Glendening

Dekeyser – Hronek
Sulak – Hicketts
Kronwall – Jensen

Howard
Bernier

Scratches: None

Injuries: Franzen, Zetterberg, Green, Cholowski, and Daley

4 Keys to Winning in Detroit:

1. Offensive Zone Time
   1. Leafs need to get a lot of Offensive zone time and begin creating scoring chances right away. Keep the pressure on the young Red Wings. As we’ve seen in the game against Ottawa, you give a young team the ability to maneuver and they will take advantage of that and soon you’ll be in a whole.
2. Lots of shots.
   1. Howard has been good. But the Leafs need to stick to their game plan and pepper him with shots. Force Howard to make saves.
3. Depth Scoring
   1. Leivo, Kadri, Brown, Gauthier, Ennis need to build off their performance in Dallas. Lots of zone time and scoring chances.
4. Clean up the Defence & Goaltending.
   1. Leafs have been hanging Andersen out to dry. They need to tighten it up a lot. Andersen needs to step up his October game, his numbers show he hasn’t been amazing but he’s been better then number show.