The win mattered for the Leafs. The win mattered for Bobrovsky.
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The man from the front office got off the elevator and answered without being asked: “He was good, wasn’t he?
“He needed that. We needed that.”
The woman from the corporate office walked down the hallway at Scotiabank Arena after the win. “That was big, wasn’t it?” she said. “He needed a game like that one.”
They have been holding their breath waiting to feel great about this Maple Leafs season, and about Sergei Bobrovsky, the expensive and aging free agent on this Leafs team of so many new bodies and so many old habits.
And in the dressing room, after the Maple Leafs unconvincing 3-1 over the San Jose Sharks, the players’ equipment was being rushed out and ready for the charter to Columbus, while only one pair of goalie pads sat alone in front of Bobrovsky’s locker.
His equipment wasn’t being moved for Tuesday’s game in Columbus. The players were heading to the airport Monday night. Bobrovsky, for the first time in his career, was heading home. The Leafs play the Blue Jackets Tuesday night. Bobrovsky gets the day off, the night of watching the game on television, the first load management day of his professional career.
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Leafs got full night out of Bobrovsky
The timing couldn’t have worked out better for a Leafs team that, frankly, could not have afforded a loss to the inexperienced Sharks this early in the season. This was Game 10 for the Leafs. Having just three wins after 10 games, which could have happened, would have been horrible. Now they have four wins. They get a full night out of Bobrovsky, who would have gotten the day off, win or lose. The fact that he gets the day off now, after a win, means he doesn’t have to stew about his lack of wins or less than impressive individual stats.
The win mattered for the Leafs. The win mattered for Bobrovsky. It was just his second of the season. Had he lost to the Sharks, his win-loss record would have been just 1-4-2 to begin his time in Toronto – the noise would have been extreme.
Now at 2-3-2 — with the goals-against average and save percentage being on the lower side of the NHL statistics, this is a place for the goalie to build his numbers and for the team to build theirs.
That’s how much the win meant Monday night. It was a night to exhale across the board. For the fans. For the goalie. For a front office that committed $21 million to the next three seasons of goalie better known as Bob.
And the win mattered for the coach, Jim Hiller, as it always does, still trying to find his place in this market. The win mattered for a Leaf team in need of points in the early season and certainly in need of structure.
The best hockey teams aren’t always about their stars and their superstars — although captain Auston Matthews is off to a sensational scoring start to the season. He had three points last night, two on the power play, one on an empty-net goal, but through 10 games the captain has 16 points in 10 games, a pace that would find him with 59 goals and 134 points.
Wins in hockey can so often be about little things and small moments. A Matthews mistake in the first period led to the only San Jose goal. Then he put his name on the only three Toronto scores. He called the win over the Sharks huge.
He called the win for Bobrovsky “great.”
All this coming just a few nights after a loss to the New York Islanders showed little growth and not much resembling possibilities.
“We made some mistakes and Bob made some good saves,” said coach Hiller. There haven’t been many nights he could make that kind of proclamation early in the season.
Akhtyamov called to back up
Before the game, though, the Leafs made a decision that might come back to matter late in this season. They decided to call up minor league goalie Artur Akhtyamov to back up on Monday and Tuesday night.
Bobrovsky played Monday. Anthony Stolarz will play Tuesday. Akhtyamov will get three days of NHL salary before being returned to the Marlies on Thursday.
This is all part of the science the Leafs are using to help their goaltenders out this season. Bobrovsky has played a century or two in the NHL, but he’s never been told before to stay home while healthy. This is the Kawhi Leonard treatment for the Leafs goalies, even though it was pretty clear that Bobrovsky has no idea who Leonard happens to be.
He welcomes the rest, welcomes the thought behind it, “In my opinion, it’s very smart,” Bobrovsky said of his first day of load management. “I’ve never done this before.”
He talked about sleeping in his own bed, eating his own food, getting ready to come back and play at home on Thursday night against the New York Rangers. How civil all that sounded.
The Sharks didn’t make the playoffs last season, nor did the Islanders. Columbus missed out on the post-season, and so did New York: This is a part of the schedule that is supposed to be relatively easy. The Leafs need to pack some of these points, as troubling as the points have come to date this season.
These were two that really mattered and were really needed. Two for the club and two for the expensive goalie in need of relaxing everyone around him.
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