🔘 7 signs these Maple Leafs could actually do the thing 🔘 Jon Cooper’s Hart pick 🔘 Why interest in Barry Trotz, Paul Maurice will spike later 🔘 + 8 more NHL goodies… 🏒 Quick Shifts | ✍: lukefoxjukebox
A quick mix of the things we gleaned from the week of hockey, serious and less so, and rolling four lines deep. Best two words in sports, baby: Game Seven.Sheldon Keefe sounded almost Yoda-esque prior to flying back to Toronto on Friday for the most important coaching assignment of his life: “The feeling in our team is one of great confidence.”
• Andrei Vasilevskiy has been beatable. True, the Conn Smythe winner looked all-world when he was under siege late in Game 6, but the Leafs have pumped at least three pucks past him in every game this series. If his .885 save percentage is a hint, the Big Cat’s insane streak of five consecutive shutouts in close-out games could be in danger.
• Let’s be honest: The Maple Leafs need it more. And it has showed in their refusal to wilt in the face of 2-0 deficits in games 5 and 6 . • One win could be a catapult. Glance around the East. Who’s scarier or healthier than the Bolts? The Maple Leafs are just as healthy and, we’d argue, deeper and more consistent than any other outfit in their conference.The individual games haven’t all been close, but the Leafs-Lightning series has been neck-and-neck by almost every measure.
A hunch: He waits until a couple of solid playoff teams lose early. In other words, don’t simply focus on the clubs with current vacancies. More could be coming. “He does that at a rate nobody in the game has been able to keep up with the past few years,” Keefe notes.
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