Spezza scrap was a wakeup call for Leafs
Fighting has increased during the playoffs — and Cherry is watching
When Jason Spezza dropped the gloves late in the second period of Game 4, the message was clear: He wasn’t going down without a fight.
While he was praised up and down by his coach and teammates for doing everything in his power to turn the game around, there was someone else enjoying what he was seeing: Don Cherry — Spezza’s friend, former mentor and espouser of fighting in hockey.
“It’s what got them going. One of the players said it after the game: Spezza’s fight woke them up,” said Cherry. “He’s not a fighter, as everybody knows. He knew the team needed something to wake them up.
“You notice, the only time the players ever bang the boards is when there’s a fight. He’s been around a long time, and he knew the team needed something. They needed a spark, and it woke them up.”
In a way, this Stanley Cup qualifying round has seen a return to the kind of tough hockey once espoused by Cherry, now deposed from his perch on Coach’s Corner. Referees have handed out 17 five-minute majors in the qualifying round. There were only nine through four rounds of the playoffs last year.
It may be a sign that there is a lot on the line in a shorter period of time. There is certainly a lot on the line for Spezza, who saw his team on the ropes and facing elimination.
“Just trying to spark the guys,” said the 37-year-old Spezza, called Vintage by his teammates. “I think just trying to show some desperation and have some push back. Sometimes without the crowd you don’t have that, so just trying to create some emotion and play the role that I’m in, and just try to get everyone going. You’re just trying to do what you can do at this time of year.”
Spezza signed with the Maple Leafs — his hometown team — to win the Stanley Cup, not to go down in four games in the qualifying round. So, indeed, the 17-year veteran who has seen a thing or two did what he felt he had to do.
The Leafs were trailing 2-0 when he took on Columbus defenceman Dean Kukan. His teammates noticed: standing on the bench and banging their sticks through it, and when it was over. The moment was not lost.
“That’s a guy who’s just not wanting to go down, literally, without a fight,” coach Sheldon Keefe said after the game. “It was great. It would have been so disappointing, of course, for it to end the way it was looking like it was going to.”
The Spezza fight was perhaps overshadowed by the three goals that tied the game, and the fourth that won it in overtime. But the fourth line of Spezza, Pierre Engvall and Kyle Clifford played some of its best hockey. They played in the final four minutes, too, giving the scoring heroes a rest between the William Nylander and John Tavares goals, and before the tying goal by Zach Hyman.
“That line in general was doing a lot of great things for our team, producing a lot in the offensive zone, controlling the play,” Mitch Marner said Saturday. “Spezza comes every day ready to play. It’s been great to be able to talk to him. He has all this experience. It’s been awesome to have on his team. That was a big fight. It got our team turned around and got us going.”
Spezza’s leadership and hunger to win is not lost on Keefe.
“Spezza has meant a lot to our group through this whole pause, and getting our team ready. He was very hungry to come back and play,” Keefe said Saturday. “He was not going down without leaving it all out there.”
Was it the turning point? Perhaps not. The Leafs went down 3-0 in the third before the rally saved their season. But perhaps it was, in terms of getting the team to focus on the task at hand.
“He wants it more than anybody,” said Hyman. “He’s been in the league for so long. He was a first-line player throughout his career, an all-star, (future) Hall of Famer, and now he’s playing on the fourth line and he’s willing to drop the gloves and give our team momentum when we’re down.
“You can’t say enough good things about Spezza. He’s a leader on our team, a huge part of our team.”
That was Spezza’s seventh NHL fight, according to hockeyfights.com. For the 27-yearold Kukan, from Switzerland, it was his second. There were no haymakers, like in the old days of enforcers, but for fans of hockey fights it fit the bill. Spezza’s most recent fight came against current linemate Clifford in the 2018-19 season, when Clifford was a King and Spezza a Star.
Spezza is from Mississauga, where Cherry lives, and played for the OHL’s Mississauga Ice
Dogs when Cherry owned them. Spezza expressed some sympathy for Cherry when he lost his job on Hockey Night In Canada in November — for inferring new Canadians don’t support war veterans, comments deemed racist and antiimmigrant by many. Cherry is carrying on with a podcast, Don Cherry’s Grapevine, and monitoring the Leafs closely.
“(Spezza) said: ‘I gotta do something, I gotta wake them up,’ and by golly he did,” said Cherry. “They’re thinking: If Spezza, who’s not a fighter, can drop the gloves and go at his age, at least we can turn it on. I really do believe it woke them up.”
The Leafs and Blue Jackets will meet in Game 5 Sunday at 8 p.m. Cherry likes the Leafs’ chances if they play a certain way.
“When they play run-andgun, that’s their style,” said the former hockey analyst. “When they play desperate, there’s no team better. They got to play desperate all the time. That’s the teams that will win. You’ve got to play desperate in the playoffs. You just can’t play a regular game.”