Toronto Maple Leafs head coach Sheldon Keefe is shaking up his lines in the hopes of closing out the club's California road trip on a high note.
With the Leafs entering Sunday's game against the last-place Anaheim Ducks on a three-game losing streak, Keefe moved William Nylander off of John Tavares' wing on the second line and instead slotted him at centre on the third. Tavares will instead centre a line with Alexander Kerfoot and Calle Jarnkrok, while Nylander will be the pivot between Nick Robertson and Denis Malgin.
David Kampf will centre Zach Aston-Reese and Pierre Engvall on the fourth line, with Malgin and Aston-Reese entering the game in place of Wayne Simmonds and Nicolas Aube-Kubel, who played in Saturday's loss to the Kings.
On defence, Rasmus Sandin was bumped up to skate alongside Morgan Rielly while Justin Holl was paired with T.J. Brodie. Mark Giordano and rookie Filip Kral made up the third pair.
“You keep confident. You keep working. You believe in your structure. You believe in your system. You believe in your teammates and the group that we have here,” Rielly said Saturday night. "And that's what we're gonna do.”
Erik Kallgren got the start in net in the second game of a back-to-back.
The moves amongst the skaters were initially a mystery with Keefe declining to discuss them during his pre-game availability. The coach then dressed his three scratches Simmonds, Aube-Kubel and Victor Mete in the warmup, a rare move.
The Maple Leafs opened the road trip with a win over Winnipeg, but have lost to the Golden Knights, Sharks (in overtime) and Kings in the three games since then.
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