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TSN Toronto Maple Leafs Reporter

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TSN Toronto reporter Kristen Shilton checks in daily with news and notes on the Maple Leafs. The team held a noon practice at Ford Performance Centre

When Maple Leafs’ head coach Sheldon Keefe pulled Frederik Andersen from Monday’s game against Edmonton, it wasn’t because the netminder had given up three goals on 19 shots. It was because, as Keefe explained bluntly after the Leafs' 6-4 loss, he wasn’t going to allow Andersen to play behind such a sloppy defensive effort.

It was a hard message for Keefe's team to hear, but an honest one that many said they appreciated.

“It just means we have to be better,” said Morgan Rielly after the Leafs’ practice on Tuesday. “[Andersen has] been outstanding for us all year. The expectation is that we're going to compete and play hard for him and obviously that wasn't the case early on in the game, so [Keefe] did what he thought was right and I agree with him. You want to put your goalie in a good situation and obviously that wasn't it.”

Keefe said it was important players understood where he was coming from, and why it made sense in the short and long-term picture to take a visibly frustrated Andersen out of the net when he did.

At that point in the game, Keefe didn’t feel it was likely Toronto would come back from the 3-0 deficit and didn’t see the point in overworking Andersen.

“With a lot of the things we're trying to do here, [we want] players to recognize that we're in this with them; it's not us against them,” Keefe said. “We're all in this thing together and working together. So when there is a time where you have to make a decision that maybe shocks the system a little bit that they take it the right way, recognizing that it's done with the right intent. With how we were playing, if we're going to talk about managing Freddie's workload, I don't see any reason why he should have been in the net going forward in that game and that's why we made that call.”

It was disappointing for the Leafs to know they had let Andersen down again, calling to mind the awful five-goal third period in Philadelphia on Dec. 3 that sparked Andersen’s much-dissected request to start again the following night.

After Monday’s loss, though, Andersen said that the Leafs hadn’t done enough to support each other and needed to stick together through the tough times.

“I think we know what he means to our team,” John Tavares said of Andersen. “We know how fortunate we are to have him and how much he's helped contribute to the results we've had. He's such a big part of that and so consistent for us. We care a lot about him and you hate to hang him out to dry and leave him with the feeling that I'm sure he left the rink with last night. So we just have to play a lot better.”

Andersen doesn’t often show emotion like he did after being pulled, slamming his mask onto the bench in disgust. Mitch Marner made sure to check in on him once the dust settled.

“I just texted him last night and asked if he wanted to play video games,” Marner said. “But I think you kind of just let him calm down. We let him out to dry and it's not fair to Freddie, with the amount of times he's saved us this year, to do that to him. I think it's on us to make it up to him for this next game.”

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Connor McDavid set the hockey world abuzz on Monday with an exquisite third-period goal, walking around Rielly and then deking Michael Hutchinson as only McDavid can.

While the Leafs fully respect McDavid’s talents, they also contend there wasn’t much Rielly could have done to stop him.

“That's a turnover when Mo is coming off the bench, flat-footed against, if not the best, one of the top two, top three players in the NHL and the world,” said Marner. “It's a hard play for Mo to adapt to that and play that and [McDavid’s] going against one of the best defencemen in the world in Mo. But that’s our turnovers costing us.”

Justin Holl agreed that McDavid is hard to contain at the best of times, and it was a perfect storm of circumstances that allowed for Rielly to be victimized.

“Mo had just gotten off the bench, and [McDavid’s] coming down with speed and he's obviously a very dangerous player,” said Holl. “So when you don't have the tight gap – and I'm not blaming that on Mo at all because he just got off the bench so there's no way you can have a tight gap on that one - but he's a dangerous player and you know that he's a guy that you got to stop earlier rather than later.”

At the same time, there was no denying what a jaw-dropping feat of coordination the goal was, something Tavares could tip his hat to.

“It's a great goal,” he said. “I think just his ability to use his edges and then create separation, and he's obviously got extremely quick hands and ability to make plays at a high speed. So just his change of speed, and to be able to do it so quickly and change direction as well, it's extremely impressive.”

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Rather than hold a regular full-team practice on Tuesday, Keefe had his forwards and defencemen separated onto two pads, with a handful of development coaches leading individual skill sessions on each.

There were a number of advantages Keefe saw to breaking from a traditional skate, and the window to do so was wide open with the Leafs at home again following a long road stretch.

“On a day like today, we try to really isolate a few really important pieces in different areas of the game that are part of the structure,” Keefe explained of the change. “I think some of those details are important, the type of details that get lost over the course of a season. So just kind of using a day like today to do that and, at the same time, it's a little bit of a mental break too from a lot of the bigger-picture stuff that you're showing them or working at every single day.”

The players didn’t mind the new format, especially with Monday’s frustrating loss still so fresh in mind.

“It's kind of like a reset day, to get your energy back,” said Marner. “Yesterday, we didn't stop playing the game, we kept fighting back and trying to make the deficit closer and closer and we cost ourselves the turnovers and the odd-man chances against and [Edmonton] isn't going to miss. So I think today was good just to get our skills going, get to handle the puck and get that confidence back in ourselves.”

Because the day was devoted more towards individual drills, it allowed players to take what they needed and head off. Auston Matthews, for example, left after 15 minutes, and Keefe said many on his team are battling small injuries and illnesses that need to be properly managed.

Keefe was also freer to observe while the development staff worked through most of the activities.

“I was able to bounce back and forth and got a pretty good idea of what was happening on both sides,” he said. “D-zone coverage is one area that we weren't very good at yesterday. We've been very good at it for the time we put together a [10-game point streak]; yesterday we took a step backwards. But within that detail of D-zone coverage, if you do your job, you then have a chance to get the puck back and you got to make the next play to get yourself out of the D-zone. That's an area we've been trying to spend a little more time on.”

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While it wasn’t a regular practice day for the Leafs, Tuesday was the first time injured forward Andreas Johnsson had been with the full group in a regular sweater (not a red non-contact jersey) since injuring his leg on Dec. 4.

Keefe cautioned afterwards that despite the development, he had no update on Johnsson’s status and had not been made to believe the forward was close to a return in the next week or so.

Keefe also had no update on defenceman Jake Muzzin (foot), other than to say he hasn’t resumed skating yet. Muzzin was injured while blocking a shot on Dec. 27 in New Jersey.