I'd be more worried if they had a history of losing to random goalies that play in significantly lower leagues. Could you imagine if the Zamboni driver got put in and beat them. You couldn't even make a movie like that because noone would believe it.
Not even comparable.... he did nothing and this game the leafs played phenomenally and the goalie was incredible. 32nd highest xgf in the nhl for the last decade at 5.9.
We also hired the idiot who made an incredibly risky decision in that game that got himself hurt knowing that there was nobody to back him up and paid him a ton of money we can't afford under the cap to sit at home. Yeah I get he's been hurt all season, that's the problem.
I'm a little sad that Steve didn't mention that the Coyotes were missing 11 players (6 in Covid protocol 5 on the IR) and 2 coaches. So the Leafs were more or less beaten by the Tucson Roadrunners. 😁
the Vejmelka “where did you come from??” thing is so real lmao. I’m a VGK fan but I tend to follow the whole league fairly broadly, and when he showed up against Vegas in preseason I was like “wow, that’s a goalie prospect I’ve somehow NEVER heard of before, wtf?” Then he promptly shut us out in that very preseason game just to shut me up lmao. Then like a week later, gave up like two goals in the first 60 seconds of a game against the Kraken and got pulled. Then a little later in the season, on back to back games he shut out the Jets, then the immediate next game gave up 6 goals to Vegas (with yeah, zero goal support). Dude’s a wild card and at this point I am keeping tabs on him just to see what he does next on any given night lmao
I was at the jets/yotes game where vejmelka completely stonewalled winnipeg for a 1-0 arizona win. The coyotes barely had 10 shots to the jets 40 something. It was absolutely ridiculous
45 or 46 shots from the Jets in that game. Clearly the quality of those shots wasn't high enough for a team with the offensive talent Winnipeg has, but dudes been insane in 2 games against Winnipeg.
@@reaganharder1480 I remember telling my buddy I was with the same thing at the game, we were like halfway through the third and I said something along the lines of “yeah they put on 37 shots but how many of them can you remember” and he could only think of like 1 or 2 actual high danger chances. Regardless I think Vejmelka just loves going beast mode against Canadian teams lol
This was kind of funny, because I remember one sdpn podcast and Steve said this about Vejmelka, "when the coyotes are going to play against the leafs Vejmelka becomes George Vezina himself"...
I forgot that we also played and lost to the Avs beforehand. Kinda crazy that both teams played and won or lost to the same 3 teams in their most recent 3 games.
@@MichaelR-ll9yf it should be easy to remember all the wins this season. That’s not a big list to keep track of. But to be fair, the Hawks don’t have a huge win list either.
Props to Vejmelka. He almost beat my Canes earlier in the season. He's a great one because anybody that plays behind that D in Arizona and plays as well as he has, despite the save % claiming otherwise, has got to be Brodeur level. Only explanation lol
In the fist period I heard the commentators say that Vejmelka's first NHL win was a 46 save shutout. As soon as I heard that I knew that this is how the game was going to go.
Only 5 regulation losses in 28 games is fantastic. You would think that they would somehow be destroying it in the standings with a run like that. However, Tampa Bay only has 5 regulation losses in their last 31 games, Florida only has 7 regulation losses all season in 36 games, and Boston only has 8 regulation losses over their last 28 games. So they are pretty much just keeping pace with the best teams in the division. In fact, in their last 10 games, The Leafs, The Panthers, and the Lightning are ALL 6-3-1, while the Bruins are 7-3. It will be interesting heading down the stretch as Toronto has to play Tampa, Florida, and Boston all in the final 8 days of the season. Home ice could be decided in that stretch.
Yeah, too many people are just jumping on the hate bandwagon and pretending like this is the same team that went to the finals last season. At least Steve keeps it real.
@@dantran9962 yep, pulled something in warmup, stopped 5 shots before Marchand scored back to back goals in 15 seconds. Motembault took over after that and Primeau is projected to start tonight against Chicago.
Be happy that 3/4 of the Coyotes roster will be gone next year. Hypothetically if the Leafs don't extend Matthews, the Coyotes will throw everything at him to bring hime home. $15mil/season, Captaincy, #34 will be ripped off the back of whoever is wearing it to give to him, endorsements up the wazoo, cars, housing all paid for, the key to the city....whatever city they're playing in. Unfortunately for the Yotes, he'll extend in Toronto, knowing how close they are to contending.
@@anthonydurante1149 they’ve been gutting the team for a minute and Ik the chances for Matthew hoping over to AZ are slim to none rn. But I’m still gonna hold out hope for later down the line, as a yotes fan that’s all I have
@@floridayote4469 honestly, i think the best chance, whether the team is contending or not, for Matthews to sign with the Coyotes is as a last-year-of-career thing, which could be an interesting an emotional cap to his career, whenever it ends.
@@zTeaTheCoffee any team can get goalied on a given night, just look at the expected goals and high danger chances. It happens, I'm not even a leafs fan but the leafs win that game 9/10 times
Being as my family hails from the Czech Republic (in truth, a town in Old Bohemia), I am all for ANY player who comes into the NHL and does good. I'll have to keep an eye on this Vejmelka fellow (especially since I've lost track of Vladimir Sobotka).
Don't feel too bad about this one Steve. Vejmelka nearly did this to the Canes earlier this season. Canes managed to win 2-1 but they outshot the Coyotes 45-20 in that game too. Vejmelka is a stud and will go places in this league.
Not to mention the fact that Vejmelka ACTUALLY did this to the Jets this year as well. The Vejmelka-led Coyotes were outshot 46-15 and left the building with a 1-0 victory. AND it was a road game for Arizona.
If you actually watched the game, it was literally a textbook "goalie-ing". Kid had a white hot night. What can ya do. Also, I don't care that its the Arizona Coyotes. They're a professional fucking hockey team. This is a cap league, its the professional sports league with the most parity in the world. Even the "shit" teams can play damn good hockey occasionally.
This is how I felt the first time the Jets played against Vejmelka. I got nervous the second time and the coyotes made it 2-1 on a Jets mistake and I was like don't pull a "leafs" and blow this one!
Oh ya, I remember that moment when Stanley gave the puck away to the Ghost and it was 2-1. I was like... "oh bleep, here we go. NO chance the Jets score another goal and AZ could easily score another 1 or 2 on the few shots they are getting." That was close. I thought it was only the Jets this guy likes to beat.
The TNT broadcast last night was the check in the box for me to indicate that Auston Matthews will be signing with a team as close to home as possible when his contract is up. The way he talked about his mother's cooking and being able to have a meal with them just tells me how much they mean to him and how much it means to go home.
I think part of the problem was, as they realized the goalie was on his game, they just started shooting from everywhere, as high as blueline many times without traffic in front. Those easy saves just boost the goalies confidence.
Vejmelka is reminding me of 2013-14 Ben Scrivens. Random dude you haven't heard much about, on a mightily bad team (Scrivens was traded to EDM in-season), and then just goes and straight-up drags his team to wins kicking and screaming once every few nights.
Armchair QB here. I was at the game. Three things; Matthews was skating and had a lot of ice time. Certainly on display in his home state. Not enough bodies in front of Vejmelka and Keefe should have sent Simmonds or Richie after Roussel. Roussel needed an adjustment.
I dunno man, that's a bit of a stretch. How many shots would Dzingel take on Mrazek in practice when both were on the Hurricanes? Also, didn't Dzingel last only 1 season-and-a-smidge of a 2nd season before being sent out of town? Also think he wasn't always the healthiest guy in the lineup. Neither was Mrazek for that matter. Anyways, I don't think Dzingel would know how to score on Mrazek. First goal was a bat-in!
I was watching that ARI TOR game last night, and that goalie was playing out of his head. First thing I thought of was OMG I wonder how Steve D was taking it? LOL
I witnessed in person Vejmelka get pulled against Seattle :59 seconds in after allowing 2 goals on 2 shots.. And then I got to witness that in person last night.. SMH
At this point last year some major red flags cropped up. Bad Special teams and stretches of .500 hockey. We haven’t hit that this year. We had slow start and a tiny 4 game blip a month ago where we were .500. This is another mini blip. Does it grow? Or so we nip in the butt? Time will tell. The latter will continue to convince me we are actually a better team than last year. A continued blip will concern me
So, Karel Vejmelka... i've seen him play 3 45+ save games so far this season. First, a 46 save 1-0 shutout win over the Jets. Next, 45 saves on 47 shots in a 3-1 loss to the Jets (last goal was empty net). And now 45 saves in a 2-1 win over the leafs. It should also be noted that the difference in his sv% before this game and his sv% after this game is larger than the difference between his sv% after the game and the sv% of former Vezina winner Connor Hellebuyck. I don't know where these performances are coming from, or if we should expect them to continue...
I won't believe this Leafs team is capable until they win a round but this game really isn't a big deal. Unlike certain other regular season losses no one is gonna remember a random January loss in April when the Leafs are playing Florida, Tampa, or maybe the 2nd wildcard team. What matters for momentum is that they outplayed the crap out of the Yotes. Every team gets goalied from time to time.
@@anthonydurante1149 that b.s means nothing lol. His reaction is just pure stupidity with zero relevance. We dominated all game with incredible chances and a 5.9 xgf ajd the goalie won.
I don't know man. Maybe I'm crazy, but these last few games don't have me that concerned? Overall good play against two great teams, and you clearly dominated the coyotes and just had bad puck luck.
0:33 When you enter the salloon but one of the swinging doors hits you in the nuts on your way in 🙃 Along with 0:24 we have two top-tier voice cracks in under a minute. This will be great 😁
let me be clear, the only leaf who gets a yeah but from this game is Matthews, because he seemed like the only leafs trying to score and *trying* to score by *trying* different ways to score. the 2nd line is looking not so good over the past games.
I was going to watch this game because I knew Matthews had the chance to set the record but then I thought... They're probably just gonna loose the game anyways and I don't wanna see that. I'm still sore from the Montreal series, it just hurts lol everything hurts 😭🤣
Just your daily reminder that your Toronto Maple Leafs traded 27 year old forward Alexander Barabonov (6G 14A 32GP) to San Jose for 26 year old foward Antti Suomela who has played only 10 games in the Marlies.
What stuck out the most was with Net empty keefe telling the boys to move the puck faster and they actually did looking similar to COL, TB even MIN. But it was like they had no idea they could or just hadn’t done it. Very obvious that needs to be improved asap
TO is too much of a circus for Evander. I’d love him beside Matthew’s or Tavares rack up the points before going somewhere else next season but won’t happen.
its kind of a...not sure what the right word is...but the leafs as a franchise have a mystique about them, that makes every team that plays against them, put in a playoff performance. they give a little (or a lot) extra effort when playing against the leafs. like a metaphysical thing. something about every leafs opponent, they always play their best games against the leafs, specially goalies. im really think, every team circles the leaf games on their calendar. i really do. if not physically on the team blackboard in the dressing room, then at least mentally. somethin about playing agaisnt the storied tml, always brings out the best in their opponents.
