Maple Leafs Notebook: Rielly’s new help, Minten’s second shot

TORONTO — Morgan Rielly is fighting it this season.

Lost amid the drama and joy of the Toronto Maple Leafs’ thrilling 7-3 comeback Saturday in Montreal is that the club’s top-paid defenceman skated a season-low 16:27.

The longest-tenured Leaf and his latest partner, Philippe Myers, struggled so much that Myers will be scratched Monday versus the Tampa Bay Lighting and Rielly will now be partnered with the reliable Jake McCabe.

Whether he’s adjusting to Craig Berube’s new dump-and-chase system, his first season as a father, or a constant carousel of partners, the bottom line is that Rielly is still searching for his A game.

“We’ve asked (for) less risk in his game. I think he’s trying to do that, and he’s done that for the most part. But we also need him to produce offensively,” said Berube, who has been encouraging all his blueliners to get more active and fire more pucks.

“So, I think you'll see his production go up a little bit.”

Rielly, 30, is on pace for 37 points this season. He put up 58 last season. His career best is 72 (in 2018-19).

Rielly dip in production has coincided with a team-worst minus-14 rating and a 9-58 takeaway-to-giveaway ratio. This despite leaving the toughest forward matchups to McCabe and Chris Tanev and starting a career-high 66.3 per cent of his shifts in the offensive zone.

Berube has had conversations throughout the season with Rielly about the coach’s power-play personnel decisions.

Rielly began the season quarterbacking PP1 but has been passed over on a five-forward top unit in favour of Matthew Knies and now Bobby McMann.

“He’s a great team guy, and he’s all about the team,” Berube said of Rielly. “So, he handles it pretty well. I’m sure he doesn’t like it. I’m sure he wants to be there, like any player would want to be there, but he understands. And he’s at a point in his career where he just wants to win.”

McCabe comes in as a fixer.

He will play his off-side, which he did well for stretches last season. McCabe says it requires a little more communication and more skating.

“Mo, his whole career, (has shown) a tremendous ability to move up into plays and find those soft areas and the second attack and second layers and be an option for our forwards,” McCabe says. “I’m just excited to play together.”

Berube has been careful to never criticize Rielly’s struggles at the podium.

On Monday, he instead emphasized how much he likes Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Tanev together and McCabe’s proficiency on the right.

“Morgan’s had a lot of partners this year, and it’s not his fault or anybody’s fault,” Berube said. “It’s just how things go with injuries and finding a right-shot guy to play over there.”

The Leafs may need to look outside the organization for that guy (Luke Schenn?), but regardless if that happens, Rielly knows he needs to find his stride.

Minten gets shot with Pacioretty injured

Inside the home dressing room, as Maple Leafs trainers cleared John Tavares’s belongings out from the leader’s centre stall and replaced the veteran’s nameplate with one that reads FRASER MINTEN, the called-up rookie felt the weight of his new seat.

“Everyone’s looking at me like: You’re really gonna sit there?” Minten smiled Monday morning at Scotiabank Arena. “I guess I have to.”

Plopped between Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner in the thick of dressing-room chatter, Minten makes his return to the big club due to another injury up the middle.

And while Berube may have preferred Minten to get in a couple full practices with his third-line wingers, Max Domi and Nick Robertson, before tossing the prospect into an important tilt versus a division rival, an injury to Max Pacioretty made this the right choice.

Pacioretty has been sidelined day-to-day with an “upper body” injury he suffered Saturday in Montreal, where he was stuck in the head by Matthews’ friendly fire. (Though in obvious pain, Pacioretty finished that game but has not been on the ice since.)

Minten showed well in his initial call-up this season, scoring two goals and two assists in 11 games, but was smartly returned to the Marlies once the Leafs returned to full health at centre.

“He brings a lot of speed, a lot of skill,” Marner says. “His IQ out there on the ice is very high. He reads the play very well; he’s in the right spot a lot of times. He’s very reliable for our D to help break out pucks.”

Adds Matthew Knies: “You can trust him in the D-zone. He makes simple, hard plays, and can score when he gets on the stick in front of the net. So, he’s pretty valuable to this team.”

In a perfect world, Minten would continue seasoning in the AHL, where he’s put up an impressive 10 points in his first 16 games.

But after a shaky performance by Domi in his own zone Saturday — he got bumped from the second to the third line and skated just 12:25, his lowest ice time all month — Berube has turned 3C duties over to Minten.

“I got trust in him,” Berube said.

Understanding Nylander

A smile as long as a William Nylander breakaway stretches across Berube’s face when he is asked about the adventure that is figuring out the smooth-skating Swede.

“That’s a tough question,” Berube says.

The coach and superstar talk one-on-one often, almost daily.

“I always want Willy to open up to me and tell me what he’s feeling and what he thinks about the game and what we can do better,” Berube explains. “He’s got a lot of great ideas. Now, I may not agree with them all. But I want to hear ’em, because there’s something there that I might learn. These guys are smart guys and smart players.”

Even smart players go through lulls like Nylander’s recent stretch, where he scored just once in 11 games and sloughed off the slump as no big deal.

Then you see him dominate his shifts and score three times in impressive wins Thursday (over New Jersey) and Saturday (over Montreal). You scratch your head.

“So, Willy… it’s a challenge. Like any player. I mean, you’d like to get that game he had in Montreal every night, but that’s not reality. He has a capability of doing it. This guy's edgework and his puck play and competing on pucks offensively, his high end — he’s a very good player,” Berube says. “It’s always a challenge to get these guys to be more consistent every night. That’s the coach’s job. And it's not just Willy; it’s every player.

“I try to really have conversations with him daily. I really do. I’m not trying to figure him out. I’m trying to hear him out.”

Knies to the rescue

Matthew Knies didn’t score Saturday’s comeback-triggering goal in Montreal, but his stick did.

Knies says he recognized quickly that McMann, a fellow tall lefty, needed a stick mid-shift and offered his weapon over the boards.

“I just thought I might as well, because I have almost the same stick as him, without the tape job. So, we kind of locked eyes there. And it was quick. It was out of my hands,” Knies says.

“He just thanked me, wiped my stick down for me, and that was about it.”

The boys have been nudging McMann to ditch the black tape job and switch to Knies’ white.

“Honestly,” Knies says. “I mean, one shift with white tape and he scores? I think he should use white tape from now on.”

Knies himself has dabbled with black but is loyal to the colour he preferred since childhood.

“I used it as a kid. I just like the look of it,” he shrugs. “There’s only two options.”

One-Timers: The Maple Leafs are diligent about monitoring the workload of starter Joseph Woll, who will tie a career-high with his 25th appearance this season…. Tampa will start backup Jonas Johansson Monday, not a rested Andrei Vasilevskiy, on whom the Leafs have scored eight goals in four-and-a-half periods this season. “Everybody reads a ton into this,” coach Jon Cooper said. “It’s all about managing the goaltenders. And we manage for 82, not one or two. It’s just the way the rotation goes. And J.J. falls in line tonight.”… Anthony Stolarz (knee) and Calle Järnkrok (sports hernia) continue skating on their own.

Maple Leafs projected lineup Monday vs. Tampa Bay Lightning

Knies – Matthews – Marner
McMann – Holmberg – Nylander
Domi – Minten – Robertson
Lorentz ­– Kämpf – Dewar

Rielly – McCabe
Ekman-Larsson – Tanev
Benoit – Timmins

Woll starts
Hildeby