As the Habs and Leafs get set to kick off tonight's match-up, I can't help but think of how much these two teams have changed over the past off season. It's a lot like cheering for any AHL team, which in itself, is another challenge... but at least you have a captain.
Toronto has gotten younger, and has increased their talent pool, whether that leads to success or more of the same, the Leafs will not be a team your talking about in May. Montreal is battling the always high expectations, and will have a tough time putting together this hodge-podge soup mix.
The lineup on opening night looks like this.
Price - Halak
Markov - Spacek
Hamrlik - Mara
Gill - Gorges
O'Byrne
Pacioretty-Gomez-Gionta
Cammalleri-Plekanec-A.Kostitsyn
Latendresse-Lapierre-D'Agostini
Moen-Metropolit-Laraque
The issue here for me has to be in goal. Carey Price was asked today, what did you do to prepare for this season. His response: "I didn't think about hockey for two and a half months, I didn't do anything with hockey or talk about it. So that I could clear my head and get ready for this season". Now, I am not a Sports Psychologist, but personally I think the off season should be spent gearing up for the season via work-outs and studying film. Sure you take a lot of time off and golf but there has to be some kind of effort.
Bob Gainey is bold, and bald, but if he doesn't get production from this team - he's out on his rear.
The Maple Leafs on the other hand, are showing progression; they have unloaded some older players and freed up roster spots for younger players to gain experience. Oh and before you ask, I don't think Kessel will score more than 25 goals this year, and he will not be effective overall (he's also out until November)
For me, the key moves for this team has to be adding Francois Beauchemin, Mike Komisarek and Jonas Gustavsson. Oh and I don't think Gustavsson will be a quality goaltender for a couple years yet, especially since the Leafs still have quite a bit of growing pains to undergo. Bob McKenzie just said Stalberg will compete for rookie of the year, I totally disagree, let's see what happens lol.
Here is the Leafs lineup.
Toskala-Gustavsson
Kaberle-Komisarek
Beauchemin-Schenn
White-Exelby
Finger
Stalberg-Stajan-Blake
Poni-Grabovski-Hagman
Stempniak-Mitchell-Wallin
Orr-Primeau-Rosehill
Mayers
