Analyzing possible Leafs line combinations and why it'd be good to experiment

When you sit in a coaches' office and try to figure out your team’s lines for the next game, what’s challenging is that it’s a very human process. (Because I like puzzles, I’d say it’s also very fun.)

Yes, the Maple Leafs would have access to a billion points of data, many of which would show who plays best with who, but that rarely falls into four neat lines. Maybe the Leafs' four best line combinations all involve Auston Matthews, maybe a good player is hurt or slumping, or maybe someone who helped a specific unit has been traded. They would have info, but at the end of the day, there’s still a handful of people going “Here’s what I like and why” and someone else saying “See I prefer this instead.”

Stuff like “He’s looked super energetic in practice lately” isn’t scientific, but you’re dealing with human beings and guessing what they’ll show next to determine whose skills will mesh together.

When you add new players to the fold, there’s less data and even more opinion involved.

That’s why right now talking about the Toronto Maple Leafs' best forward lines is fun. Ryan O’Reilly brings a wildly new element to the group, Noel Acciari does too, and the positional flexibility of the latter gives them even more options.

Here’s what they’ve gone with through three games:

When healthy, there are no more “Marlies” left in the group. They can feel confident that the guys who may come in with any injuries – Wayne Simmonds or Pontus Holmberg, or Bobby McMann maybe – will be more than capable of not just keeping up, but of providing some value. The Leafs are officially deep-deep up front.

Through three games after the O'Reilly-Acciari trade, the underlying stats are not overly complimentary (given they led in two of those games for long stretches and just kinda hung on), but here are some conclusions:

The “trickle down” of two forward additions has created a “fourth” line of Aston-Reese – Acciari – Kerfoot and they are a force (probably closer to a second line on most non-playoff teams). Over three games Kerfoot has led all Leafs forwards in expected goals for, with his line all hovering somewhere around 80 per cent in expected goals for percentage, meaning that for every five chances that occur while they’re on the ice that line gets four of them. Acciari and Aston-Reece hit everything that moves and pucks get coughed up, while Kerfoot has speed that you can’t find on many fourth lines. It’s a good group.

But the conversation has really centred around the decision to move Tavares to left wing and play O’Reilly between him and Marner, rather than going Matthews-Tavares-O’Reilly down the gut.

Sheldon Keefe has said he’s wanted to give that combination some run to figure out if they work well together, and through two games, some people didn’t like it.

My stance was two-fold: I think Tavares should be left playing centre and that the one-two-three punch maximizes their assets, but I could see what Keefe saw with the chemistry of “The Passion Line” as they’ll probably be called. In fact, pre-game I put a bit together on their small area passing, and how I liked their potential:

After the game, Keefe did mention that Tavares probably will go back to centre at some point, but they wanted to know if there would be any chemistry with those three guys together. (Breaking: there is chemistry.)

One thing that made sense in starting them together was integrating O’Reilly to the team and getting him off on the right foot. This way he got to play a few games with team leaders, get to know them best, have some success against lesser teams, and start off feeling good within the group.

But there's one thing I don't like about having Tavares on the wing: wingers often come to a complete stop in the D-zone. Yes, as a centre you have to come back further, and you’re involved in physical confrontations that can be draining and take away from your offence. But being low and following the play means centres are almost always moving, and Tavares’ top speed isn’t so much a problem as is his acceleration/quickness. So as a centre, he’ll more often have some momentum to help him get going up the ice, rather than trying to jump from a stop.

The Leafs' wingers (think Nylander) often go from that dead stop to flying the zone, pulling the opposing D out with them and creating room underneath for the team to break out. With Tavares, I think the opposing D could sit on their breakouts a bit more.

Plus, we know that without O’Reilly the Leafs' top-six can hang with the top-six of most any team. Matthews and Nylander are deadly, Tavares and Marner can do their thing, so if you suddenly then get a little help from O’Reilly and Jarnkrok/Engvall every other night (or even Acciari’s line), those could be the goals that get them through a Game 7 once and for all (or gasp, sooner than that).

Let’s take a look at another option, which is probably what they’ll go to next when they’re ready to experiment some more:

Bunting – Matthews – Nylander

Kerfoot – Tavares – Marner

Jarnkrok – O’Reilly – Engvall

Aston-Reese – Kampf - Acciari

Maybe the top-six doesn’t look like an all-star team quite like it once did, but that’s the reality of playing in the NHL – if you look loaded anywhere, you’re almost certainly weak somewhere else. This is a more balanced approach, and that third line could be an absolutely smothering defensive unit with the potential to chip in (given they wouldn’t be in their own end much).

I like it fine, but I am intrigued by some other thoughts, those being:

• Might the Leafs want to give Marner back to Matthews at some point to see if they can get the big rig playing the way they’ll need him to in the playoffs?

• If that happens, would they ever consider moving Bunting away from Matthews (which they may like because he wins pucks and occupies the net front, both of which help 34)? I like Bunting-Tavares-Nylander, if Kerfoot could slot in with Matthews and Marner.

• You can shuffle up the wings around O’Reilly and Kampf above (Acciari can bump up, Engvall down, etc.). But a related thought to wing-shuffling is: if you want to create a bottom six that can actually produce offence instead of having two defensive units, would you bump a guy like Acciari up into the top six (who’s averaged over 15 minutes of ice time on good NHL teams before) strictly to keep guys like Kerfoot/Jarnkrok/Engvall available to play with O’Reilly and hopefully create a few goals away from the top competition? Ken Hitchcock recently said on Real Kyper and Bourne “The top two lines tend to roughly saw off the goals in playoffs, who’s gonna score in your bottom six?”

The Leafs, like just about all teams in the hard (and flat!) cap era, are not without flaws. They’d love to add a defenceman and goaltending is still a big fingernail-biting topic, but their forward group now has as many options as any team in the league, and that’s a good thing. When the puzzle pieces only fit one way, you’ve got one way to roll them out.

Facing different opponents and injuries and hot and cold streaks, you like to have the ability to play around with your combinations to win when the going gets tough. At least up front, Keefe has that in spades.

How he chooses to deploy those names could be the difference between another post-season frustration, and meaningful success.