[Lanny_McDonald]

Originally Posted by 868904

To be fair, that is your best defensive centreman in Backlund. It's not like he put Ryan with Lucic and Nordstrom out there.

To be fair, the other two players are your worst defensive players on the team and can't skate with the likes of the players they were matched up against. Couple that with your weakest defensive pairing and its a match made in hell. Ward had last change and he chose to put those lines head-to-head, TWICE, and it cost the team. That was a mistake that should not be allowed to go by unnoticed.

Backlund had a pretty bad game.

Backlund has been bad all season so far.

To me the problem is mental with this team. After the last game, all you heard was the Leafs got lucky. That's loser talk. Winners look at themselves in the mirror and go out and kick ass the next night. If you lost, it's because YOU didn't do enough, it's not because of luck. You make your own luck. The Leafs drove the net and got shots to the net and the puck went in, don't be disrespectful and say they got lucky. Keep your mouth shut and just give the opposition their due when they beat you. If you were any good, you wouldn't have allowed those shots and opportunities in the first place. Stop with the loser talk because we've been hearing it for years with this group. Just go out there and win.

I agree. I hate the term luck. You make your own luck. It is up to the players to generate the luck. It is up to the coaches to set the players up for success so they will achieve their optimum performance and generate that luck. When the coaching staff mismanages the bench and does not play the right combinations of players so they can perform at their optimal levels, that is a failure and all the luck in the world is not going to manifest and help the team win. It is very much on the players to perform, but it is up to the coaches to put in place successful strategies and match up talent for specific roles. If the coaches can't make appropriate combinations that maximize the talent of the players, and don't employ those players at times when they are likely to be successful, then the players are not going to achieve optimum performance and the team will not achieve optimum success.

I knew this team would come out and #### the bed in the first because they thought the Leafs lucked out a win in the previous game. They thought they could coast through and win this game because they were entitled to it, because "teams don't sweep these two game sets".

They were over confident and ill prepared and it showed in a turd of a first period.

Is it not the coaching staff's responsibility to prepare the team for the game and get their heads straight? When the team "collectively" comes out and plays like that, it is usually something systemic. It is not like one or two guys came out and looked like deer in the headlights, it was the whole damn team. They were not properly prepared for what was coming their way and that is partially on the coaching staff. They are the ones who get to design and implement the game plan. Yes, when the players don't execute there are problems that land on the players. But when the team is collectively out of sync, you have to ask why? When the coaches continue to put bad matchups against the opposition, leading to getting run over, that is on the guys managing the plan and the bench.

Trust me, I'm willing to run guys over who aren't performing and showing they can play at this level. I'm willing to back that bus up and make sure they have the appropriate level of tread marks on them. The players have to get #### done and when they don't they get called out. But this is clearly on the dip####s behind the bench. This loss is on them. And not surprisingly, the same guys that I like to point out as weak links on this team were the ones on the ice when the Leafs won the game. Its funny, but when you have a culmination of bad performers, terrible match up, and bad zone assignment you regularly achieve a negative outcome. That was achieved last night in a soul crushing way and was completely avoidable with a simple coaching decision. A decision repeated within minutes of each other. The players didn't execute, but the coach put out his weakest against the opposition's best, TWICE, and thought it was a going to lead to success. That's a massive problem.