Game 8 Preview: Toronto Maple Leafs @ Ottawa Senators

Remember those (many, many, many) years when the Leafs were horrible, so we had to work ourselves up a little bit for the Battle of Ontario? Well, those times have now passed. The Leafs are the current betting favourites to win the Stanley Cup due to their 6-1-0 record and league-leading +12 goal differential. (barfs)

How will the Sens be trying to counter them tonight? Here are the lineups via TSN’s Brent Wallace and Mark Masters:

Some thoughts on tonight:

• Logan Brown keeps his lineup spot, and this time, he’s at his natural centre position with call-up Chris DiDomenico and Nate Thompson. I’d expect Thompson to take any D-zone draws if they get caught on the ice. I wouldn’t expect this line to play 8+ minutes tonight..
• With Mitch Marner on L4, JVR on L3, and Patrick Marleau on L2, the Leafs are a tough team to matchup against. I’m of the opinion that Guy Boucher sometimes overthinks his matchups — it’ll be interesting to watch what he does tonight, especially with the defence pairings.
• Only Philadelphia and Carolina have given up less goals than Ottawa in the East, while the Leafs 34 goals scored is the top in the conference.
• Toronto floods the area around the net with shots, and does pretty well with limiting shots getting to the front of theirs
• The team generally gets more shots for than shots against when most of Toronto’s players are on the ice; the exceptions to this are the Zaitsev - Gardiner pairing.

Team Stats

(via NHL.com + Natural Stat Trick)