Power flickers for Matthews
Centre dropped from top special teams unit, but using him less simply doesn’t add up
It was only a few months ago that the Maple Leafs’ blazing power play was the talk of the NHL. Scoring nine times in Toronto’s first seven games, it looked as magical as it appeared unstoppable.
And as the goals piled up, so did the praise. Nick Kronwall, the veteran Red Wings defenceman, spoke of Toronto’s globe-trotting fancy-pass show as being “good for escrow” — a suggestion that a high-scoring, star-driven powerhouse could fuel a noticeable uptick in hockey-related revenue that would benefit all members of the players’ union. Pierre McGuire, the NBC analyst, likened Toronto’s 5-on-4 prowess to some of the great units of all time.
“As much domination as I’ve ever seen in 31 years in the league,” McGuire told TSN radio one day in October.
Scoring at a league-best 47 per cent clip through seven games could give anyone the idea that the uber-talented Maple Leafs, armed with a man advantage and the murderer’s row of skilled sticks, were a weapon beyond compare. But a few months later, not so much. Since that early deluge of production, Toronto has made good on just 17 per cent of its power-play chances. The Leafs are an even-worse 5-for-43 — a sputtering 12 per cent — in their past 15 games. That red-hot October seems eons in the rear view.
“(The power play) was fresh. Nobody had seen it,” Auston Matthews was saying Wednesday, explaining Toronto’s early success. “But everybody watches video. Everybody watches your tendencies. They adjust. That forces you to adjust. And sometimes those adjustments don’t work out too well. Then you go a couple of games without a goal and then everybody starts panicking.”
Speaking of which, on Wednesday, in the lead-up to Thursday’s game in New Jersey, head coach Mike Babcock unveiled a bizarre tweak. Matthews was moved off the No. 1 unit to play the left side of a second unit across the ice from the slumping William Nylander.
Matthews’ replacement on the first unit? Kasperi Kapanen, he of the zero career power-play points.
Babcock has talked about striving for “machinelike” performance from his team, so it follows that the robots need to be brought in for reprogramming every once in a while. But even if Matthews happened to be a nonsentient machine, you could see why the move
wouldn’t compute. Toronto units Nos. 34 and 24 — Matthews and Kapanen — are hardly interchangeable parts.
So while Matthews took it all matter-of-factly — “I have no problem with the switch, obviously” — he wouldn’t have been wrong to be ticked. Toronto has plenty of power-play problems, starting with the fact that the Patrick Marleau-led second unit has been mostly useless, receiving about 40 per cent of the power-play ice time while producing just 24 per cent of the points. Matthews, though he hasn’t produced a man-advantaged point in the past seven games, is a long way down the list of concerns. He’s third on the team behind Morgan Rielly and Mitch Marner with 11 power-play points despite missing 14 games with a shoulder injury. On a perminute basis, he’s by far Toronto’s best producer of offence with a manpower edge, not to mention at all strengths.
And Toronto’s top unit, on which Matthews has so far played exclusively, is by far its best fivesome. The combina- tion that’s mostly consisted of Matthews, Marner, Rielly, John Tavares and Nazem Kadri has produced about 76 per cent of Toronto’s powerplay goals while commanding just 60 per cent of the powerplay ice time.
Which is to say: The better move would be to play Matthews more, not less. Elsewhere in the league, top guns get more run with the man advantage. The likes of Tampa Bay’s Nikita Kucherov and Steven Stamkos have found themselves on the ice for something closer to 70 per cent of the minutes on the Lightning’s league-best power play.
So how does it make sense to move Matthews to a unit that’s so far been getting about 40 per cent of such opportunity? Babcock suggested it would induce better internal competition.
“I still like when you have two (power-play units) and you compete to see who’s out there,” said the coach.
Too much shouldn’t be made of such overhauls; Babcock also reserved the right to “change it back any time.” But it’s worth noting that this is the second time in recent memory that Babcock has poked at Matthews. It was only a few days ago that the coach, asked about Matthews’s progress, suggested he needed to up his work ethic.
“You’ve got to keep grinding to get better,” Babcock said, speaking of Matthews. “God touched you with the wand, gave you the skill. But he didn’t necessarily give you the work ethic, the grind every day to keep getting better. If you want to be the best of the best, it’s a long career.”
Matthews is doing OK, so far. You can make the case he’s the most efficient offensive player in the NHL. He leads the league in goals per 60 minutes and ranks second behind Kucherov in points per 60 minutes. And considering Matthews ranks 85th among NHL forwards in all-strengths average ice time, he can make the case his chief problem at work is a coach who doesn’t call his number enough.
No matter. Babcock insisted that the answer to Toronto’s man-up woes begins with a grindstone and a willing nose.
“The No. 1 thing is you’ve got four penalty killers out there, and they get paid to work hard … You’ve got to outwork the penalty kill or you don’t score,” Babcock said on Wednesday.
No doubt there are times that’s true. There are also times when a coach insisting his players need to work harder sounds like a coach out of better ideas. No one’s saying Babcock and his staff don’t know what they’re doing; the Maple Leafs ranked second in power-play efficiency just last year, they’ve been awesome at times this season. But things change. Opponents adjust. And when various Maple Leafs were asked about the problems with the man advantage on Wednesday, let’s just say on-ice hustle didn’t appear top of mind.
“A lot of times it gets too stale. We just do the same thing over and over again,” Matthews said. “You see teams that are good on the power play, they’re doing different stuff. Maybe they’re going down low, behind the net, doing different stuff, giving the other team different looks … I think that’s something we could definitely work on.”
The good teams do different stuff: If it wasn’t a blatant indictment of the Xs and Os, it certainly wasn’t an all-star falling on his sword. Which seemed about right. How, after all, do Toronto’s most creative players, only a few months ago the awe-inducing darlings of the league, find themselves so stuck in a rut?
I’ll accept two answers. It’s either a) coaching, or b) overcoaching. One player agent who represents a prominent Maple Leaf (not Matthews) suggested a while back that some players feel constrained by the scheme. There’s a fear that veering from it could result in demotion. On Wednesday those words rang true. If Matthews can be reassigned to PP2, you can, too.
But if Toronto’s power play continues to need a reboot, here’s guessing management won’t be so intent on blaming the robots.
Babcock says the answer to Toronto’s man-up woes begins with a grindstone and a willing nose