The Toronto Maple Leafs understand full well the fact they need to be consistently strong throughout the current NHL regular season, lest they fall behind their Atlantic Division rivals and wind up missing out on the playoffs. But there are some stretches of their schedule that are tougher than others. And the Buds are about to kick off one of the toughest portions of their schedule.
That portion begins with a showdown tonight with the visiting Vegas Golden Knights, but it quickly ratchets up into games against the defending Stanley Cup-champion Tampa Bay Lightning and veteran-laden Boston Bruins; Toronto’s subsequent opponents in this stretch are the L.A. Kings and Philadelphia Flyers – and then the stretch ends with back-to-back night games against Calgary in Toronto and against the Sabres in Buffalo. After that, the Leafs take on Nashville, the New York Rangers, Pittsburgh, and the New York Islanders.
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Not many “gimme” games in that mix, are there? If the current season has shown hockey observers anything, it’s that, aside from the Arizona Coyotes and Chicago Blackhawks, there are few teams that can be considered pushovers. Indeed, most teams will present the Leafs with a decent obstacle to winning, and Toronto is going to need different players stepping up at different parts of the season if they’re to be successful heading into the 2022 playoffs. It’s not as if the schedule eases after this new stretch.
Once they’re done taking on the Isles Nov. 21, the Leafs go on a quick trip to California to take on the Kings, Anaheim Ducks and San Jose Sharks, then they play five games in eight days, taking on the Colorado Avalanche, Minnesota Wild, Winnipeg Jets, Columbus Blue Jackets and the Lightning for the second time this year. Again, are there any teams in that list that the Leafs ought to beat each and every time they play? No. The Avs, Wild, Jets and Bolts are playoff-capable squads, and the Blue Jackets are unexpectedly thriving. And all of them – yes, all of them – could be left reeling if the NHL’s injury bug continues to be as voracious as it’s been this year.
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The league’s Olympics-related compressed schedule makes life difficult for all teams, and good health will be necessary for each of them to have a bona fide shot at the post-season. This is why it’s been vital for teams to have a solid start to this season in particular. One bad month in a normal season, and a team can find itself buried. But in this season, you’ve also got to factor in a player’s potential spot on an Olympics roster, and we know there almost assuredly will be injuries that take place at the Beijing Games.
One patch of failure, or one sequence of misfortune, can take a team’s future out of its own hands, and force it to be reliant on opponents late in the season as playoff spots are being determined. In short order, any team’s future can spiral out of its control. That’s what the Leafs are up against this year. They’re no different than virtually every other team in the league in that sense, but their less-than-ideal 4-4-1 record means they’ve got some catching up in the standings to do. And it begins Tuesday night, against a Vegas team that is the 2021-22 season’s poster-child for the value of good health and difficulties that come without it.
Win the majority of these games – and avoid regulation-time losses at all costs – and the Leafs can give themselves some cushion in the standings, with the knowledge that they probably will be increasingly tested on the health front. Lose them, and Toronto allows others to dictate their short-and-long-term future. There’s no game more important than the next one for Toronto, and it’ll likely remain that way.
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