PITTSBURGH — Sidney Crosby has some concerns when he ponders playing against the Maple Leafs duo of Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner.
“I’d say a lot,” the Pittsburgh Penguins captain said on Tuesday morning. “Between the speed and the shot and Marner’s playmaking ability … Matthews doesn’t need much time and space to get that shot away.
“They create a lot, and you’ve got to be able to play in their end. If not, it’s going to be a long night. As soon as they possess the puck, they’re going to be able to generate chances. For us, our best way of defending is trying to hold on to the puck and trying to play in their end.”
The Leafs, of course, have enough of their own in-house concerns. They’re coming off one of their worst efforts in the season in a 5-2 loss against the Buffalo Sabres on Sunday night, and after a day off on Monday, underwent some changes at the morning skate at PPG Paints Arena.
Coach Sheldon Keefe doesn’t think his group has been overly connected in recent games, winning just once in regulation in the past nine.
New lines included Jason Spezza between Kyle Clifford and Dmytro Timashov, and Frederik Gauthier centring Pierre Engvall and Kasperi Kapanen.
Defenceman Martin Marincin, a healthy scratch the past eight games, will play on his 28th birthday and be paired with Travis Dermott. Rasmus Sandin will skate alongside Tyson Barrie. Timothy Liljegren will be a healthy scratch.
Neither Egor Korshkov, who scored in his National Hockey League debut in Buffalo, nor Mason Marchment will play. Marchment was returned to the Toronto Marlies on Tuesday afternoon.
In goal, Frederik Andersen, one of the few bright spots in Buffalo, will start.
“I have to get them opportunities to play and put them in good spots,” Keefe said of his bottom six forwards, whom he addressed as a group at the end of the skate. “We haven’t got enough out of them and that’s on me as a coach. I want our group to be thriving and we don’t have a lot of guys thriving there right now.
“I think our top guys have been playing extremely well, but we haven’t had the results that we’d like and a lot of that is because we’re just not rolling as a cohesive group. We need to get everybody moving.”
Regarding the changes on the blue line?
“(The Penguins) are going to be very competitive, very physical and they’re going to really work,” Keefe said. “It’s going to be high-paced, so we just thought that Marincin might be a little better-suited to handle that at this stage than Liljegren, who has played a lot of hockey recently.
“(Sandin and Barrie) will play in a lot of offensive situations, (be on for) offensive faceoffs with some of our better players.”
With the trade deadline six days away, there is some debate as to whether the Leafs should be sellers (a sill notion), but there’s no question the Leafs’ mental approach has to change.
The lead on the Florida Panthers for third place in the Atlantic Division has shrunk to two points.
“It’s an important week for us,” Matthews said, noting the rematch against Pittsburgh on Thursday in Toronto.
“It’ll be a good test for us to get back on track and hopefully string along a couple wins together. They’re a great team, they’ve been playing really good hockey lately.
“Every night (we have to be) bringing that consistency as a team, no matter what the situation is, who we’re playing, what kind of environment we’re in, where we are in the standings.”
The Penguins, led by Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, would be a fine example for the Leafs to follow.
“That’s really cool,” Marner said of Crosby’s comments. “It’s a guy I grew up watching and wanted to be like. Stepping on the ice against him, it’s always a fun time, always a challenge.
“You still see videos of his workouts and on-ice stuff in the summertime and how hard he works, it’s impressive. A lot of young kids still look up to him.
“For me, that’s something that I always watched when I was growing up, was seeing how hard he worked on off the ice, during games, no matter the score, he never gave up on plays. It’s something that a lot of people idolize.”
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