Leafs Try To Turn It Around In Second Half
Posted January 28, 2008 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Paul Maurice stood on the ice and barked orders to his Toronto Maple Leafs during practice Monday, but it would be hard for even the stone-faced bench boss to admit he pictured the second half starting with his team where they are.
Toronto is second from the bottom in the Eastern Conference as they kick off phase two of this year’s campaign, meaning there’s a lot of work to be done if Maurice’s pre-season prediction of the Buds vying for the Cup is going to come anywhere close to true.
But of course, players stay toeing the company line.
“Every day we come in here to work you gotta have a belief in what you’re trying to accomplish,” veteran Darcy Tucker insists. “We’re six points back and we have thirty some-odd games here to go.”
The scrappy forward’s point is a good one. The Leafs may have five teams between them and the playoff picture, but only three wins separate them from the second season. Closing the gap with the laundry list of injuries the club is facing, however, is a whole different story.
“It’s not always a good thing to see guys go down but at the same time there’s a little more urgency in everybody,” observed backup goaltender Andrew Raycroft. “We’re not looking at other people to help us, we work a little harder each of us and pull our weight a little more.”
For his part, Maurice says it’s nothing new for the club and that they’re just starting to find a rhythm.
“You go back to last year we hit a big rash of injuries and went 8-4-1 in January with a pretty young crew,” he said.
To be sure, there’s not a citizen in Leafs Nation that isn’t hoping for something similar in February. They’ll get their first post-break action Tuesday night at home against the St. Louis Blues.
