The Leafs played a very bad game against the Sabres and lost 5-3. They deserved to lose, and even Anthony Stolarz wasn't very good all the time. He made some very good saves and he owns some of those goals against, but the team also contributed. It was like a pot luck of yuck.

They managed to take the gloss of Dakota Joshua's first goal for the Leafs, one he and his line worked hard for. That line, with Nic Roy as centre and Easton Cowan on wing, was really good. Everyone else... not so much. Although the fourth line helmed by Max Domi did their job.

Now it's fair to say that with Tanev and Rielly both out of the lineup, that left the Leafs with Dakota Mermis playing second pair, so it's not like they had a good defensive corps. But the Sabres had a lot of key players on IR as well.

That illustrates several things: that the quality of the Leafs offence was actually okay. They were, at times, very themselves offensively, and they had a lot of rush chances. But also, the Sabres weren't all that great and didn't need to be. What's damning is that the Sabres dominated in Expected Goals in the third period with a lead. Just like the Devils did last game.

The neutral zone control of the puck was awful, zone exits were three tries to make it stick, and by the time they got to the offensive blue line, dumping it in to get a line change was often the only option.

And they get to try again today at 5 pm.

William Nylander left the game in the third.

There was no update on this postgame.

In other news, in case you missed it, Joe Woll is back with the team, and will work towards returning. No further information was forthcoming.

Morgan Rielly has practiced and was at morning skate yesterday, so he is not seriously hurt, but he may be out again today.

Now enough of that. Time for a refreshing reprise of a pinch hit grand slam:

Preview will be out later.

From The Branches