Maple Leafs dominate Penguins on Hockey Night: Leafs Rundown

It feels like games against the Penguins are always slightly cursed, but this one worked out pretty well. The Leafs kept the pressure on the Penguins, earning a 4-1 win.
From that first early goal on, the Leafs were healthily in charge of this game. Here are some thoughts on the game.
Behind The Net
No, not the ancient, now defunct stats website. This is to do with the success Toronto had tonight forcing the Penguins defenders to face the wrong way. Twice they capitalized with a pass behind them that scored on Casey DeSmith. First on goal #2 by Pontus Holmberg, and again on goal #3 by William Nylander:

PONTUS HOLMBERG 🚨
WHAT A SHOT! TOP CORNER! pic.twitter.com/T3x8A8IOAQ
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 27, 2022

WILLIAM NYLANDER 🚨
IT’S 3-0! pic.twitter.com/UP2bygPzcb
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 27, 2022

Källgren performance
The Swedish 3rd string goalie has been filling in with the Leafs a lot this season, with injuries to both Matt Murray and Ilya Samsonov. It’s not often that the 3rd stringer has the most starts, 2 months into the season, but with his 9th start for the Maple Leafs tonight, Källgren has that strange honour.
The netminder has only had 2 “quality starts”, plus a third excellent performance in relief against Boston; the remainder have been well below average. This 1-goal-against performance Pittsburgh is definitely a boon to his season stats. He did only face [SHOTS HOW MANY???] in this one, but this is an undeniable success.
No defenders, no problem
With 3 of the Leafs’ apparent top 4 defenders out on injured reserve at the moment, it would be expected that the team would struggle defensively. And certainly, the team’s shooting stats have taken a hit in that regard. In the last 2 games, the Leafs allowed a lot more even strength shot attempts against than normal, ~63 per 60 minutes, versus ~53 per 60 minutes for the previous 20 games. That’s a small sample to be sure …

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Author: Ryan Hobart / The Leafs Nation

Rielly vs. Sandin on the right side, why Robertson will have to wait, and not shopping the waiver wire: Leaflets

It feels like it’s been a long ass week. I had to check to see when the last time I wrote a Leaflets post was because it seems like it’s been forever. It was apparently last week. Maybe the rest of you aren’t struggling with the passage of time as much as I am, but I’m sure this pointless article intro is giving you some of that experience. Anyway, here are some bite-sized thoughts on the Leafs heading into a week filled with cuts and Justin Holl trade rumours.
Rielly vs. Sandin on the right side
A lot was made during the contract process that Rasmus Sandin didn’t want any part of playing on his unfavoured side. Or maybe that is something we just started putting out there to justify the delays in negotiations.
A lot has also been made of Morgan Rielly’s willingness to play on the right side, and Sheldon Keefe’s quit reaction of pointing out that he’s giving Rielly his reps there but doesn’t have much interest in moving him off the left side.
In reality, both of these players have a good chance of seeing the majority of their season on the left side, because injuries happen and that’s why Victor Mete and Jordie Benn are here, to take the guess …

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Author: Jon Steitzer / The Leafs Nation

been feels It's like long Week

The Mark Shapiro Era Draft Retrospective: 2018

Although it feels like just a year ago, it’s been over 4 years since the 2018 draft.

It has to be said that this was the current regime’s most creative draft. They went underslot with their first round pick, just to go overslot with their third rounder. Those two players also went to the same high school and were seniors at the same time, so this will be a pretty interesting article.
Jordan Groshans:
Selected with the 12th overall pick, the 22-year-old is the first player in this series to currently be on MLB Pipeline’s Top 100 list. Let’s look over each season of the utility player’s career.
In 2018, he played for the two rookie league teams. He posted a .296/.353/.446 slash line in 207 plate appearances. He hit five homers between the two levels, a rather impressive display of power early in his professional career.
Moving on to 2019, Groshans was promoted to the Lansing Lugnuts in A ball. In 96 plate appearances, he slashed .337/.427/.428 while adding two homers. He had a K% of 21.9 (a career high), but walked 13.5% of the time, which is also a career high). In May, he had an undisclosed left foot injury, which ended his season prematurely.
Much like every single other minor league player, Groshans didn’t participate in the 2020 minor league season, because there wasn’t one. However, Groshans played at the alt site, where he re …

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Author: Brennan Delaney / Blue Jays Nation

Although feels It's just like year