NHL places USA’s young stars’ Olympic aspirations on hold

Yes, spring break always brings the snowbirds and students to Carolina, Tampa Bay and South Florida, but in Nashville on Thursday, every honky tonk on Broadway seemed to have someone with an Auston Matthews jersey and a cowboy hat.

Marner took a pass from Connor Carrick, skated on Howard on a 2-on-0 rush after a poor Red Wings change, and deposited his 18th goal, giving Toronto a 2-1 lead.

There are already people responding to this release with fear of lockouts, which …

Leafs score first on a power play goal by James Van Riemsdyk.

Just this past March 25, the Leafs were soundly spanked in Buffalo by a 5-2 margin, spoiling a stretch of good hockey that started two weeks earlier. However the National Hockey League had been looking for more concessions that were believed to include marketing opportunities tied to the Games.

Matthews expressed disappointment while also acknowledging he’s more preoccupied with helping Toronto clinch its second playoff berth in 12 seasons.

Toronto lost center Brian Boyle to an upper-body injury, possibly from a hard collision with Wilson in the first period. We gave them a little too much respect in regard to letting them walk right in.

It’s amusing to think back to all of the concerns about Babcock’s lack of experience coaching rebuilding teams and developing young players coming off of his many years coaching a strong veteran core in Detroit. They also won their second straight and fifth in six games to remain in third place in the Atlantic Division. The two are tops of the Leafs defence in that time in shots-against-per-60 and Goals For Percentage, with Polak all the way up at a 70.0 GF%.

“The van Riemsdyk goal, the defenseman shot, looks like it’s going blocker side and then all of the sudden it’s back on his stick and glove side, tried to get it close and just didn’t”, Red Wings goaltender Jimmy Howard said. They’re going to create enough (chances) on their own. Polak has started almost 42% of his shifts in the defensive zone in the last two months, the highest among Leafs defencemen. Finally we are seeing the end result. If you pick a guy and he ends up being terrible, you shouldn’t get a do-over. The Caps maintained a five-point lead over Pittsburgh for the top spot in the Metropolitan. You want to please the fans because of all they’ve been through and all they continue to put with.

Auston Matthews, who had his team-leading 36th goal against the Preds, said Andersen is allowing the Leafs to learn the art of the ideal road game.

“We’re in a good position right now”, Matthews said. “We’re doing that, but we can’t stop yet”. We watched Canada follow up a dominant performance in the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games with yet another stellar outing at the Sochi 2014 games. The tally was O’Reilly’s 20th of the season, marking the third time O’Reilly has scored 20 goals in his career.

He’s had some impressive games against the Sabres this season and looks like he’ll be a throne in the Sabres side for years to come.

Gus Nyquist, Nick Jenson and Niklas Kronwall had the other goals for the Red Wings. Matthews had scored in five consecutive games, tying the Maple Leafs rookie goal streak record set by Gaye Stewart in 1942.

Players such as Michigan-born Matt Hunwick and Windsor’s Matt Martin have a strong bond with the place, but coach Mike Babcock spent a decade behind Detroit’s bench.

“I’ve seen that a couple of times from him”, teammate Mitch Marner said. With the sheer size and talent, the kids today possess, no team is a guaranteed favorite and isn’t more exciting now knowing that come 2018 we’ll have no idea who will win?