Toronto Maple Leafs have trio of goalie options to choose from
The Toronto Maple Leafs have a few different goalie options to consider moving forward.
Despite being up 1-0 in the series in the second round over the defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers, the mood isn’t exactly jovial among Leafs fans right now.
For the foreseeable future, the team is expected to be without starting goalie Stolarz, who was knocked out of last night’s 5-4 win following a collision with Panthers forward Sam Bennett and a puck off of the mask earlier in the game.
Bennett avoided any supplemental discipline for the play, with the NHL Department of Player Safety not expected to crack down on the incident.
Coming in to replace Stolarz was Joseph Woll, who led the Leafs with 42 appearances in net this past year, putting up a .909 save percentage and a 2.73 goals against average.
Given that the NHL averages this past year were .900 and 2.81 for save percentage and goals against average, respectively, Woll’s track record shows that he can be a slightly above-average netminder even if he is not a star.
Woll entered the year with more playoff experience than Stolarz, having seven career postseason appearances and four career starts. Stolarz hasn’t officially been ruled out for any length of time as of Tuesday morning, but it’s hard to imagine he’ll be playing games anytime soon.
But while Woll is the clear-cut No. 1 guy moving forward unless Stolarz is able to recover from the injury that sent him to the hospital, he’s not the only option the Leafs have to consider.
Last week, the Leafs called up 14 members of the Toronto Marlies from their AHL affiliate following a short-lived Calder Cup playoff run that lasted only two games. Two of those players included goaltenders in youngster Dennis Hildeby and veteran Matt Murray.
Hildeby joined the Leafs on the bench for the third period last night following the Stolarz departure, as Toronto has been using him as their third-string goaltender since his AHL callup. A 23-year-old from Sweden, Hildeby played the only six games of his NHL career this season, putting up a .878 save percentage and a 3.16 goals against average.
Murray, meanwhile, played his first NHL games in nearly two years this past December, though he stopped just 51 of 58 shots to put up a .879 save percentage mark over the two games, a far cry from his two Stanley Cup runs with the Pittsburgh Penguins in 2016-17.
In any case, we should get some more news soon about how exactly Toronto plans to use their goaltenders going forward, and for the team’s sake, we hope that we see as few people as possible occupy the Leafs’ net.
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