The time has come, Leafs Nation, for a quick review.
Vesa Toskala and Andrew Raycroft have been ripped for their inconsistency in the crease.
Bryan McCabe has been criticized after being exposed on the Leafs backend.
And Jiri Tlusty… well, he’s been the butt of jokes for exposing his backend on the Internet.
But the coach, Paul Maurice?
Thanks to his keen sense of humour and cozy relationship with the Toronto media, he’s emerged relatively unscathed. Until now, that is. Because the time has come to put Maurice under the microscope.
We take you back to Saturday night’s Hall-of-Fame game against the New York Rangers, a contest that should have sent the Leafs leader to the Hall-of-Shame. By now you know all about the pre-game trash-talking involving the motor-mouths of Sean Avery and Darcy Tucker.
But as Don Cherry bellowed in Coach’s Corner, “Where the heck was Wade Belak?” The big enforcer is pulling down $625,000, making him the highest paid mascot in professional sports. But the Leafs already have Carlton the Bear to entertain the kiddies.
Sure, Belak is a witty fellow and does some solid comedic work on Pravda, uh, make that Leafs TV. But every once in a while, it would be nice to see Belak get a chance to perform his real job. After all, if Belak would have grabbed Avery and smacked him in the mouth, maybe his lips wouldn’t have been quite so loose and perhaps Avery wouldn’t have enjoyed so much success busting loose from the Leafs defencemen when the real game got underway.
Speaking of the blue line, Maurice’s management skills were brutal against the Broadway Blueshirts. The Avery, Gomez and Shanahan unit had Tomas Kaberle and Pavel Kubina completely tied up in knots. So, what happened after the trio scored the first goal against the K.K. combo? Maurice neglected to sit their behinds on the bench and a minute later, Avery, Gomez and Shanahan struck again. Come on, Paul. Even a Pee Wee coach knows that when you give up a goal, it’s time to get some fresh faces over the boards.
Maurice’s handling of his netminders also has a lot of folks scratching their noggins. Last Friday in Buffalo, Andrew Raycroft played one of his finest games in blue and white, shutting out the Sabres 3-0. But for Saturday night’s home tilt against the Rangers, Raycroft sat on the pine and watched Vesa Toskala take the reins. Right from day one of training camp, Maurice talked about how he was looking for one of his puckstoppers to pick up the ball and run with it. But if racking up a whitewash on the road isn’t Maurice’s definition of heading for daylight, the Leafs ‘tenders are destined to be one confused combination.
Raycroft has been given a rough ride by boo-birds at the Air Canada Centre but after his big game in Buffalo, fans would have been chomping at the bit to give him a nice reception. That would have provided Raycroft with a confidence boost and maybe the extra adrenalin could have helped him win the game by stopping the shootout shots that Toskala couldn’t.
You’d like to give Maurice a pass and chalk up his brain cramps against the Big Apple to the fact that he was simply having a bad night. But In Tuesday’s loss against Montreal, Maurice’s mental approach raised some more eyebrows.
In a high risk 3-on-3 overtime situation, Maurice decided to throw Bryan McCabe over the boards as the extra session was just beginning. Still shaky from running into his own net and scoring on his own net earlier this year, McCabe completed the dubious hat trick by putting the puck right on the stick of Mike Komisarek, who roared back the other way to win it for the Habs.
The next day, Maurice agreed with media suggestions that McCabe often gets himself in trouble by trying to force the puck into dangerous areas.
No Sherwood, Sherlock.
That’s akin to Montreal Alouettes coach Jim Popp making a ludicrous decision to go for it on 3rd-and-1 late in Sunday’s CFL East final. The gamble failed, the Als blew the game and afterwards Popp admitted that his club had struggled in short-yardage situations all season long.
Memo to Paul and Mr. Popp: If you’re constantly getting burned, quit sticking your frickin’ fingers in the fire.
But on Thursday, the Buds got burned again, this time in Beantown. Former NHLer turned Hockey Night in Canada analyst Scott Mellanby has knocked the Leafs coaching staff this year for deploying the only man-on-man defensive system in the league. Thursday, as Boston buzzed around Toronto territory, Leafs radio analyst Jim Ralph chimed in with a similar observation.
“At least once a period, the Leafs get running around in their own zone and the end result is that they force a face-off. The only problem? The face-off is at centre ice.”
Ralphie is one funny dude and so, too, is Maurice.
But if he doesn’t start making better decisions behind the bench, Maurice could soon be unleashing his witty remarks beside all the other former coaches and players that wind up in the broadcast booth.
