Sheldon Keefe comments on ''sloppy'' loss to Blues
Last night against St. Louis, the Leafs found themselves down by 2 goals on four separate occasions and battled back each time to eventually force overtime. Following the shootout loss, Sheldon Keefe downplayed the sloppiness of the Leafs and referred to their defensive struggles as a "recalibration" more than anything.
"I think it is recalibrating. You can tell it hasn't played together and is not in sync, both in the pairings and in the players. Sandin is coming off of a break. Mo is coming off of a really long break away from playing. All of those kinds of things are going to take time to fall into place," said Keefe regarding the Leafs' defensive struggles. "I thought we made some mistakes and paid for them, but I liked the way we kept coming back. After costing us early in the game, the power play came through for us to ensure we got the point. Not a night we are going to love too much, but we are fortunate to get the one point here."
-Keefe on what may have contributed to the Leafs' loss to the banged up Blues
-Keefe on what may have contributed to the Leafs' loss to the banged up Blues
Keefe makes a very valid point, given that Rasmus Sandin has missed the past couple of weeks with a neck injury and Morgan Rielly missed almost 2 months with a knee injury. It will take some time for them to get comfortable again. It will also take some time for the pairings of Rielly and Brodie, as well as Timothy Liljegren and Sandin to gel again after not playing together for lengthy stretches.
While Keefe wished Ilya Samsonov made a save on the Blues' short-handed goal, he was also quick to defend his goaltender, saying that there was not much he could do on any of the other goals. Samsonov's consecutive home wins record came to an end at 9, but his recent struggles over the past couple of weeks are starting to become a bit of a concern. The Leafs will look to rebound Thursday night against the Seattle Kraken when they visit Scotiabank Arena. It wouldn't surprise me if Keefe went right back to Samsonov with the message for the rest of the team to tighten things up and provide their goaltender with the support he needs in order to thrive, much like the way the team played throughout November and most of December.
| POLL | ||
JANVIER 4 | 271 ANSWERS Sheldon Keefe comments on ''sloppy'' loss to Blues Do you blame Samsonov for the loss last night against St. Louis? Or was the loss more on team defense being sloppy? | ||
| Sammy needs to be better | 114 | 42.1 % |
| The Leafs need to play better team defense | 157 | 57.9 % |
| List of polls | ||
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