{"id":543671,"date":"2026-04-06T11:54:54","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T11:54:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/543671\/"},"modified":"2026-04-06T11:54:54","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T11:54:54","slug":"craig-berube-frustrated-with-maple-leafs-defensive-zone-coverage-vs-kings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/543671\/","title":{"rendered":"Craig Berube frustrated with Maple Leafs\u2019 defensive zone coverage vs. Kings"},"content":{"rendered":"

Craig Berube frustrated with Maple Leafs\u2019 defensive zone coverage vs. Kings<\/p>\n

Berube spoke to reporters postgame and there were two areas of his team\u2019s game that he felt had the most impact on the outcome.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe came out hard. I thought we played a hard game,\u201d Berube said. \u201cWe were in the box a lot. We took too many penalties. But the penalty kill did a good job, and the goalie did a good job along with the PK. The power play was good,\u201d stated Berube postgame after a wild back-and-forth affair vs. the Kings.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the third period, it came down to three shots from the high slot, where they scored three of them. They\u2019re all defendable. We didn\u2019t flex out quickly enough. We were there, but we weren\u2019t close enough. That was the difference in the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Maple Leafs<\/a> crumbled in the third period, giving up three goals in 1:38. Berube felt the d-zone coverage became suspect, and Toronto left the Kings with too much room to operate. \u201cI just thought that they were kind of grabbing control a little more in our defensive zone. We weren\u2019t killing enough plays in the third period. They were finding people. They were just too open.\u201dJoseph Woll<\/a> made the start Saturday night against the Kings and allowed seven goals on 40 shots. It\u2019s not often you see a goaltender give up a seven spot and be praised for how he played after the game. That\u2019s how bad the Maple Leafs defensive coverage was against the Kings, as Berube didn\u2019t mind at all what he saw out of Woll in LA.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were a lot of shots, on the power play especially. As I said, he did a good job there. I\u2019ll have to look back on it and see if there was something he could\u2019ve done differently. Obviously, on one, he gave it away there, and that was a mistake. But that happens. I think he is obviously seeing something that he thought was available, and it wasn\u2019t. It\u2019s the way it goes. His effort was excellent. He saw a lot of shots.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Maple Leafs head home and don\u2019t hit the ice again until Wednesday night against the Washington Capitals. With just five games left, it will be interesting to see how Berube handles his remaining postgame press conferences, considering he\u2019s certainly on some thin ice to end this season.<\/p>\n

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\nFollow along @Tablefood hall or\u00a0tablefoodhall.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Craig Berube frustrated with Maple Leafs\u2019 defensive zone coverage vs. Kings Berube spoke to reporters postgame and there…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":543672,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5126],"tags":[5,186,1760,240,5303,793,145,5304,5302,4],"class_list":{"0":"post-543671","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-kings","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-kings","10":"tag-la","11":"tag-la-kings","12":"tag-lakings","13":"tag-los-angeles","14":"tag-los-angeles-kings","15":"tag-losangeles","16":"tag-losangeleskings","17":"tag-nhl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116357635154814348","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=543671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543671\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/543672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=543671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=543671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=543671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}