Month: March 2023

The Calgary Flames have had their struggles this season with inconsistent goaltending, lower than expected success from two of their summer acquisitions (Kadri, Huberdeau) and a tight race in a rather weak division.  Do they stand pat and hope for the best – or do they become buyers on deadline day?

The Toronto Maple Leafs are coming off a rather embarrassing loss to the Oilers on Wednesday night.  They were outplayed and succumbed to a very assertive Edmonton squad.  Luke Schenn and Eric Guffstaven were added to the roster for tonight’s tilt.  Liligren got banged up in Edmonton last night and Coach Keefe decided to go with 7 D and 11 forwards.  Joseph Woll got the start in goal for Tranna while Jacob Markstrom started for Calgary.

The first period was a tight-checking, playoff style affair, made more interesting by the Leafs  odd starting configuration.  You saw, Marner with AM 23 and Nylander, O’Rielly with Accuri and Laffertry and so on.  Good mental gymnastics for Coach Keefe.  And, that’s not even counting the numerous d-pair combos he had to deal with.  Mind Boggling.  Blake Coleman scored the only goal of the period on a short handed breakaway at the 2 ½ minute mark.

Mitchell Marner continued his good work, scoring his 22^nd by weaving and winding through the offensive zone to pop one in 5-hole to tie it up at the 12 minute mark.  Like 2 seconds later MM16 is gone to the box for a high stick.  Kadri scored for Calgary but it was called back for being offside.  The 3 new d-men for the Leafs all looked good one on one, clearing their zone and head manning the puck.

The Leafs were determined to rebound from their previous night’s poor performance.  They showed great hustle and tenacity throughout the third.  This resulted in a great rush goal from Nylander up to Mo Reilly and an eventual slam dunk for Calle Jarnkrok to put his squad up for for good.  Great team D held the Flames off for the rest of the game.

HOPPER NOTES:  I don’t know bout y’all, but I am not getting up at 8 am to see if JVR, Brock Boesser and/or Joel Endmundson will be traded…the thrill is gone…give me the hilites at 2:30 EST …I will bet you that Sheldon Keefe’s new freedom of 7D and 11 forwards (Ashton-Reese sat out) was the most fun he’s had in a while… the d combos settled down after two (didn’t see much of Guffstasen in the third), but the combo’s he put together up front really gave him a chance to use his imagination…I thought Kerfoot and Woll both had good, solid games…of our 3 new d-men, I would give Luke an A, Jake a B+ and Guffstasen an (I)…KYLE, bring me John Gibbons ! …Captain Johnny needs to get his groove back…I am certain my new friend Jenny will concur – CHEERS !

By way of review:

            IN:                                                      OUT:

  Ryan O’Rielly                                    Rasmus Sandin

  Noel Accurai                                     Pierre Engvall

  Jake McCabe                                    Joey Anderson

  Sam Lafferty                                     First Round pick

  Erik Guvstason

  Luke Schenn

  First round pick                               WAY TO GO KYLE !

WOW, I don’t know what we’re all going to do after 3 pm on Friday !  Add to the above, from today:  Jonathan Quick + 1 First and 1 Second to Columbus for Goaltender Korpeselo and D-man Gustenov and then Jacob Chykren to Ottawa for 1 First and 2 seconds.  I actually do feel bad for James Duthie and the TSN panel.  How in the hell are they going to provide 8 hours of content with the scraps that have been left on the table ?!?

As for tonight, we do have an NHL Hockey game between two the of league’s top teams.  Luke Schenn and Erik Guvstasen were not available to the Leafs and Mathias Ekholm did make his debit for the Oil.

When you come in to Rogers Arena in Edmonton, who else do you expect to see a lot of other than SUPERSTAR Connor McDavid.  He’s only scored 8 goals in his last 4 games (incl. his 50^th), won the Moson Cup as the month’s top player and continues to lead his team to the playoff promise land.  So why should we expect anything different when the Leafs visit ?  Auston Mathews who took the Richard, Art Ross and Lester B away from him last year added a little more incentive.   Sure enough, #97 scored two on his own (51 and 52) and assisted on Zach Hyman’s 29^th to help the Oilers take a 3-1 lead in to the second period.

The big knock on the Edmonton Oilers has been that while they can fill their opponents net, they can’t seem to keep it out of their own.  My observations from the second period was that the Oilers ground Toronto in to the ground, no matter what offensive tools they have.  Scrambly play turned in to downright boring play except for the goals from Tyler Yamamoto and Kostin in the back half of the period to extend Edmonton’s lead to 5 to 1.  SOG were 25-18 for the Oilers.  I choose to put this down as the Maple Leafs failure to recover from a late night at the rock show and familiarizing the new guys to their systems and approach.  Flimsy, but I’m OK with that.

Nothing much changed in terms of flow and tenacious Oiler checking in the third.  Mitchell did pop in a PPG from Reilly and AM34 early but it didn’t really.  Toronto was beaten by a better team (5-2) on this night.

HOPPER NOTES:  Big question, is Kyle Dubas done ?  I believe he needs to try and re-stock the draft pick cupboard a little by maybe thinning out that 9 d-man scenario (Holl as an example ?)…Mathais Ekholm got his first point as an Oiler and looked pretty good doing it…the “Core 4” (except for Marner) was a big zero on this night…I can’t remember TJ Brodie being quite so aggressive on offence as he was tonight…my first chance to see Sam Lafferty and Jake McCabe in Leafs colours was quite pleasant…Lafferty is a strong skater, likes to hit opponents and has a strong PK game…Jake McCabe came as advertised, solid, nothing fancy, strong on the puck and like I used to tell my 5 year old Timbits, he guards his goalie…CHEERS !