TORONTO – Much like their fans and their talk-radio pundits, the Toronto Maple Leafs took time to watch the replay of Alex Killorn pouncing on their most important player’s head and held a discussion about their own players’ reaction.
Which was no reaction.
No facewash. No roughing penalty. No nothing.
Andersen was more emboldened than rattled by the indiscretion. He slammed the door and the Leafs won a tight, important 2-1 hockey game.
So, Sheldon Keefe, would you have preferred to see one of your players get in Killorn’s mug?
“Yes and no,” Keefe replied. “I mean, you want someone to acknowledge it and speak up that it’s not acceptable, but at the same time, I really believe strongly that you can’t overreact to situations like that.”
When Keefe played for the Tampa Bay Lightning at the turn of the century, he amassed thrice as many PIMs (78) as points (24). His NHL career has given him some perspective when weighing the merits of sparking a scrum.
[relatedlinks]
“I just don’t buy into the fact that you make a big scene and you overreact, and then it’s like someone’s gonna say, ‘OK, I won’t do that anymore.’ That’s just not reality. I think that the players [bumping the goalie] know what they’re doing, and they’re pretty methodical about it. You have to trust that the referees are going to protect the players on the ice, and it’s our job to win the games on the power play,” Keefe explained.
“That said, we want it to be, you know, standing up for each other, we’re a family, all that kind of stuff, but it’s very important, especially this time of the year, that we’re being composed.”
An intimidation game gets waged within the game. The rules are blurry, though. And the final box score can colour the narrative of who won the psychological and physical contest.
With all due respect to Kyle Clifford (who was not on the ice at the time of the Killorn collision), the Maple Leafs’ power play is their true enforcer. That’s by design. And it has landed some expert combination blows in their two recent victories over Tampa.
“That suggests it’s a good time we didn’t do anything,” Andersen said. “It’d be undisciplined to go after him and then take a two-minute penalty for something that didn’t really matter. I think that that could hurt us even more, giving them the power play for something like that.”
Defenceman Travis Dermott agrees: “You don’t want to take any penalties. So, if someone’s taking a liberty to Fred, we’re gonna do something, but I think it’s all situational as well.
“They’re probably doing it to get in Freddy’s head or to get one of us to take a penalty.”
Discipline won the night.
But hovering over these divisional battles is a strong likelihood that these same two clubs will be grinding it out against each other in Round 1 of the playoffs, where attrition and nastiness become more common than whistles. Like it or lump it, over seven games, each bruise is an investment.
The Lightning — skilled and speedy, like Toronto — have purposely balanced 2019’s Presidents’ Trophy–winning, post-season-flopping roster with some bite, adding players like Patrick Maroon, Zach Bogosian, Barclay Goodrow and Blake Coleman in preparation for some blue-collar crease-clearing and, evidently, crashing.
Toronto’s identity is to intimidate through its sauce passes and wrist shots. The mandate is to not wilt during puck battles, but it’s difficult to envision these Leafs engaging in, say, the outburst of mayhem that enlivened last weekend’s Bruins-Lightning tilt.
Dermott and Keefe both said Tuesday that intimidation ain’t what it used to be.
“It’s a skilled, fast game now, right? So I think a lot of it’s kind of just being smart and picking your spots more,” Dermott said. “Penalties are way more common.”
Keefe isn’t even sure if intimidation is the right word to use anymore, with how the game is trending and the style of players that compose the majority of rosters.
Today’s NHLer must impose himself on his opponent, Keefe says, “through speed and physicality on the puck, limiting time you have with the puck and how quickly players close on you and put you in uncomfortable positions, rather than you know there’s gonna be any sort of violent repercussions or anything like that.”
From the top, the Maple Leafs’ plan is to assemble a team of players capable playing through uncomfortable circumstances.
The challenge will be sticking to that plan, and rising above the nasty fray, when push comes to shove.
