Keefe mixing, matching and winning
Team is full of holes, but can clinch a playoff spot Wednesday — thanks to a few surprises
What every NHL coach is looking for at this time of year is clarity — on forward lines, defence pairings and potential Stanley Cup playoff opponents.
Given the way injuries have swept through the Maple Leafs lineup and how the post-season races are playing out, clarity is not an option for coach Sheldon Keefe.
So, he’ll take what’s behind door No. 2: options, thanks to the growth of inexperienced players in bigger roles — including a makeshift third line of second-year NHLer Pontus Holmberg (24) between 22-yearold Nick Robertson and 21-year-old rookie Matthew Knies.
“They’ve been playing well playing together, all three of them,” Keefe said of his Kid Line. “It creates an additional challenge for them. They don’t have the experience to lean on with others. They’re trying to feel it out for themselves.”
Robertson has scored in back-toback games on breakaways. Knies had a goal and an assist in Monday night’s 6-4 win over the Florida Panthers, and has five points in his last four games. Holmberg assisted on Knies’ goal and has done a good job forechecking and creating plays.
Keefe recently acknowledged they are only a line because of injuries to Mitch Marner (high-ankle sprain) and Calle Järnkrok (hand): “Who knows what the future holds, but when we get healthy I don’t see it as a trio.”
But they are now and, with the Leafs up 5-1 in Monday’s game, Keefe challenged them to shut down Florida’s top line. They didn’t; Vladimir Tarasenko and Sam Reinhart scored with them on the ice, cutting the lead to 5-3. The experiment ended.
“I made a decision in the third period about just going with other guys that I thought could get it done for us,” said Keefe. “When they’ve given up two goals in the third period and now confidence starts to wane a little bit, for young players, you have got to try to protect them in that moment as well.
“I was exposing them to some tough matchups on purpose, and to me they were doing well in that regard early in the game. And then in the third it didn’t go as well.”
Throw in late-blooming 27-yearold forward Bobby McMann and often-injured 25-year-old defenceman Conor Timmins and Keefe’s been getting a closer look at what some less-experienced Leafs are capable of.
Still, heading into Wednesday night’s visit by the Tampa Bay Lightning, the Leafs are just a point away from clinching a playoff spot for the eighth season in a row. The younger players don’t have a great deal of playoff experience at the NHL level, but Keefe said he isn’t worried.
“Playoffs in the NHL are a far different animal, but these guys have all played playoff games,” the coach said. “Matthew Knies played for us just last season, but they’ve played pressure situations in college or world juniors. Pontus Holmberg was a playoff MVP in Sweden. These guys have all played in that time of the year before … To me, it’s just more about their continued development in the NHL, less about playoffs necessarily. To that end, we’ve been really happy with them now.”
With defenceman Morgan Rielly expected back from an upper-body injury on Wednesday night, the mixing and matching will continue.
“We’ve got time, but we don’t know what time will tell us in terms of defensive pairs. We don’t know who’s going to be healthy, we don’t know who our opponent is going to be,” said Keefe. “What we like is, we’ve got options. We’ve got nine players on defence now that have all done a good job, have all played against good teams, have all helped us win games and have been flexible in who they’ve played with and what their roles have been.”
Health and handedness will factor into who comes out of the lineup when Rielly returns. Timothy Liljegren (upper body) and Joel Edmundson (undisclosed) are out longer.
Rielly didn’t want to go into detail about the injury that cost him four games: “It’s just about trying to make sure you’re right for playoffs.”