The Toronto Maple Leafs have an advantageous schedule to start the season, if they can take advantage of playing on home ice, that is. The first 10 games of the season are either at home (eight are at Scotiabank Arena) or a short plane flight (to Detroit) or bus trip (to Buffalo next Friday). Toronto is 3-1 so far at SBA and takes on the Seattle Kraken on Saturday night, hoping for a better fate in a Seattle – Toronto matchup than the Blue Jays fared on Friday.
The distribution of the schedule thus far has allowed the Leafs to lean heavily on goalie Anthony Stolarz with Joseph Woll unavailable, and Cayden Primeau a questionable backup. Stolarz will likely make his fifth start on Saturday and play against New Jersey on Tuesday before having to split back-to-backs to end the month of October.
Stolarz was spectacular in a 2-1 overtime victory over the NY Rangers on Thursday, making 28 saves on the night. The Leafs could not hold a precarious 1-0 lead going into the third, but got the win on an odd-man break sprung by Morgan Rielly, with William Nylander setting up Auston Matthews for the game-winner.
The Leafs played the same lineup that pounded Nashville earlier in the week, with rookie Easton Cowan playing on the top line with Matthews and Matthew Knies, but in a tight game late in the third, head coach Craig Berube played more experienced forwards in place of the 20-year-old on the top line.
Steven Lorentz sat out his second straight game on Thursday, but will likely return to the lineup against the Kraken, which will force a lineup change. Winger Nick Robertson is the likeliest to be a healthy scratch, which will cause a pot stirring of the bottom six. This situation will become more complicated later this month when center Scott Laughton returns to the lineup. There is no way to know whether the Cowan experiment will last very long, but if he continues to be a fit on the top line, that will give GM Brad Treliving and Berube a good problem to have.
Calle Jarnkrok is having success with three goals so far, and is unlikely to be scratched any time soon, which leaves one of Lorentz, Bobby McMann, Max Domi, Dakota Joshua, and Nicolas Roy to sit down when Laughton returns. If Cowan is not demoted to the AHL, Treliving will have to make a move of some sort to activate Laughton.
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