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The Maple Leafs have never faced the possibility of losing an entire six-game home stand.
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But to prevent a fifth straight defeat Thursday at Scotiabank Arena will require a combination of safe cracking and skullduggery, by a Toronto team that hasn’t been thinking fast on its feet at all.
The Central Division-leading Minnesota Wild is the NHL’s best defensive team, entering play Thursday with a 2.20 goals-against average and just 24 even-strength goals allowed, compared to the Leafs’ ugly 51.
“They’re going to be a very tough team and they have some high-end offensive weapons (led by Kirill Kaprizov),” said centre Teddy Blueger. “But we don’t expect it to be easy against any team. We’ll just have to find a way.
“There are a lot of good things we’ve done lately, we just have to piece them all together.”
What’s the Leaf history with six-game stands?
After close losses to Utah and Montreal, Toronto was outscored 10-3 by New Jersey and Colorado since Sunday, including empty-netters. After the Wild come the Edmonton Oilers and Connor McDavid.
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This 11th stand of six or more games since 1972-73 have yielded Toronto’s worst results so far. The closest comparison is January of 1979, a few weeks before coach Roger Neilson was fired and rehired by Harold Ballard in the tragi-comical paper bag caper. That edition had two losses and two ties in its opening four, with another draw and defeat to endure before finally ending with a win.
At least four losses have happened three times on such a stand, the only instance at Scotiabank Arena in 2002-03, while the best home run record belongs to the explosive Leafs of 1989-90, who won six of the eight straight they played at the Gardens.
Who is still out for the Leafs?
Toronto’s injury list, headlined by the week-to-week absences of forwards Kirill Marchenko (lower body), Colton Sissons (lower) and defencemen Nick Blankenburg (upper body), Marshall Rifai (lower) and Morgan Rielly (lower, day-to-day) could be joined by fourth-line winger Zack MacEwen. His wrist injury from the Avalanche game was being assessed on Wednesday which kept him from practice, but coach Jim Hiller said there has been some improvement.
Seventh defenceman Cole McWard took MacEwen’s place at practice with Blueger and Brandon Duhaime, who played three years for the Wild, his draft team, up to the spring of 2024.
“You have good friends over there, good guys, character guys, but no friends when that puck drops,” said Duhaime.
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