OverDrive - Biron on Matthews' injury impact, Ovechkin's skill set and the Atlantic Division race

Episode Date: December 30, 2024

TSN Hockey Analyst Martin Biron joined OverDrive to discuss the biggest storylines around the NHL, Auston Matthews' injury impact to the team and the timeline to return, the Sabres starting to heat up and Lindy Ruff's coaching approach, the Rangers, Alex Ovechkin's goal-scoring skill set, the Atlantic Division race in the spotlight and more.

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The smarter way to book travel. Marty Baran is with us now. Marty, this is an absolutely bizarre story, but the Sabres find themselves battling Detroit and the Rangers of all teams to stay out of the East Basement. How does this even happen? Well, I mean, they lost to usendon for a lot of that 13 games. Now he's back and he's made a big difference.

I think he was named the second star of the week for the NHL. But you're right. Look, if the Sabres had gone 4-6-3 instead of 0-10-3, they'd be tied with the Ottawa Senators for the second wild card spot. Like, going 13 games without a win is that in the NHL. And look, because the teams that are in the playoff spot or around the playoff spot are still just middling, the Sabres can look up and say, oh, we're only eight points out.

Like, that's really what it is. Can you make a couple of points here and there? Like, if you say, okay, we're going to make three points per month. Like, in the month of January, we'll make three. In the month of February, we'll make three. In March, we'll make three. Then you're nine points back. You've made up nine points.

Is it possible? Yes. Is it unlikely? Probably, but that's how weird this season has been for not just the Sabres, but a lot of the teams in the East. Look at Montreal. Montreal is a game under NHL 500. They're five points out of the playoff spot.

Who would have said that a month ago? Yeah, Marty, it has been bizarre, and there's a lot of teams that are one winning streak away from being right back into it, including the Sabres. But what did you notice? Like when you went through, when they went through the doldrums of that horrible losing streak, 13 straight, and then they get this thing rolling

where they're winning big against, albeit, some not great teams. Like what has been the sort of discernible difference to your eye with the way they're playing? It can't just be one guy, right? What do you think it is? No, it's not just one guy. Look, Alex Duck hadn't scored in a lot, then he gets a hat-trick against Chicago.

Thompson has got going again, so that's good. He got a power play goal. The power play was awful. In the 13-game winless streak, the power play, I believe, had only one goal, maybe even just two in the 13 games. If you don't score in the power play, this is a one-goal-makes-a-difference type of league. And if you go 11 of 13 games where you don't score in the power play, well, that's 11 games that you don't give yourself a chance to win.

So that was a big difference. And then they gave up a lot of goals. They were giving up four, five, four or five. So yeah, you don't want to put it all on goaltending because I feel like the team was not playing well defensively, but there was a combination of a lot of things that were going bad. Lindy Ruff, who has coached, what, the third most games in the National Hockey League, said this is the toughest solve in his coaching career. He's seen things and he's been around, but he said this is the toughest solve I've had to deal with in my coaching career. So I joked to him one time I was seeing him at the morning skate.

Actually, it was the New York Islanders one where they won, finally won a game. And I said, Lindy, do you want me to strap him back on? He goes, come on in, kid, get dressed. And I said, Lindy, do you want me to strap him back on? He goes, come on in, kid. Get dressed. And I said, oh, no, you don't want that. And he started laughing. Well, maybe that's what got him going, the thought that maybe I was next in line. They didn't want that to happen.

I mean, that had to be a real test in everybody's perseverance. So, you know, how bad did it get? Well, you know, I asked Lindy that same morning. I said, how you doing? He says, Marty, how you doing? I'm like, I'm good. Coach, how you doing? And he goes, you kind of looked at me like, how do you think I'm doing?

Like, really, with that look. You lose 13 in a row. That's tough. And the way that they lost. Like, there was games where they were up 4-1 on Colorado. They were up 3-1 on Toronto. They were up 5-3 on Colorado. They're up 3-1 on Toronto. They're up 5-3 on Detroit. You lose these games, and only one of them went to overtime.

You only got one point in three games where you're up by multiple goals and let it slip away. Scoring first, they were scoring first a ton. And then, whoops, the first goal, well, it doesn't matter. I think the Sabres now are above NHL 500, but they were the only team that had a losing record when scoring first in the NHL. Now they've found their way back out of that with their three wins now. But I mean, that's tough when you know that most teams win roughly 65% to 70% when scoring first, the Sabres had a losing record.

Like, that's why it's been really tough on everybody's, you know, mental preparation because even if you say we're going to come out hard and get the first goal, well, that didn't lead to wins either. Marty, when you look at Lindy Ruff, I mean, obviously, they make the coaching change. They move out Donnie Granato, and they bring in Lindy Ruff, who's very familiar to Sabres fans, you know, going back a generation as a player and a coach.

I mean, you know, a guy who's, as you said, seen things in this league. I mean, how have you seen him operating under these circumstances? What do you think makes him a good candidate to help this team through what it's going through right now? When I played for Lindy Ruff, it was really tough love. That was the era of the Pat Quinn, Scotty Bowman, and Pat Burns and those guys. So it's tough love.

Like if you didn't perform, you sat or you were in the press box and that was it. Now he did that to a couple of players and, you know, Jack Quinn was an LT scratch for a lot. Now Jack Quinn is going again. Dylan Cousins was moved from center to wing. Now Cousins is back in the middle with Paterka and Quinn and they're working. Power had a turnover against the New York Rangers. He sat a whole period. Paterka had a

turnover against the Rangers. He sat a whole period. So I think that that's what Lindy Ruff kind of resorted to is saying, okay, I'm going to go back to I need to show tough love here. Everybody's got to be accountable and it worked. It worked in small samples. Can coaches do that over 82 games now? No, that's not how this generation

of players, and rightfully so, that's not how it works anymore. But in small samples, you can do it. And the one thing with Lindy Ruff also Everywhere he's gone When he's had success He has really good goaltending Because he likes to play an up-tempo game Let's create off the rush Let's have the defense Join in as a Second layer

But if you lose the puck or turn it over Your goalie needs to bail you out Dominic Kasich, Ryan Miller Just to name a few goalies that had success under lindy ruff why because they were making saves and they bailed the guys out so the last few games we're seeing lukinen getting a star of the game you know even james reimer in the game in boston losing two to one he played really well but you need goaltending if not you're not going to win games.

You know, the interesting thing about this particular scenario is that the coach had been hired in the summer, so he couldn't be blamed for this, which is, in a lot of other situations, it would be remove the coach because you can't change the players. They didn't change the players, and they didn't change the coach, and they found their way out. That's pretty odd, isn't it?

It is pretty odd because this is going to be the fourth, well, this is now the fourth time this year that the Sabres have had a three-game winning streak. They're going to look to make it four in a row for the first time this season. Look, successful teams would say, hey, after 38 games, 37 games, we'd want to have four three-game win streaks, right? That would mean that, you know, you're putting up wins in the bank and you're above 500 and you're probably in the playoff spot. That 13-game losing streak really hurt. But you talk about the roster.

I think this is a really good roster. This is a roster that's better than last in the Eastern Conference. Paige Thompson, Alex Tuck, Jason Zucker was brought in, has played really well. You look at, you know, Zach Benson is only 19 years old, but he looks very, very mature. It reminds me a lot of a Clodham, new Brad Marchand type of player with how he gets to the front of the net. And the defense has power, Darlene and Byram, just to name three of them. So this is a really good roster. It just so happened that they couldn't figure it out.

They literally could not put one foot in front of the other for 13 straight games. But the rest of the season, they've looked pretty good for 24 of the 37 games. Marty, the big conversation in Toronto right now is about Austin Matthews. He missed nine games. He came back. He's now four games into his second injury-related absence of the

year. He's going to miss tomorrow's New Year's Eve afternoon game as well. That'll make it 14 games this season, Marty. What do you make of it looking from where you're looking from? The idea that Matthews hasn't been able to get right. He's on 32-goal pace after scoring 69 goals a year ago.

How do you assess that situation? Well, isn't Coach Berube kind of of slipped a little bit mentioned something about his back i think i read that somewhere something that you know it may be back related and and if it is then it's you know it affects your whole body it affects how you skate it affects how you shoot it affects how you go into traffic um so that would make sense right if you look at austin matthews kind of production this season and say, okay, this is something that's affecting him. But I look at the Leafs and I think,

okay, they have the roster to be able to overcome Matthews missing sometime in the regular season. So Marner has stepped up and he's played a huge role, right? Tavares has looked good. Willie Nylander has looked really good. The goaltending has been

you know at way above my expectations at the start of the season yes I know Stolarz is still hurt but Joseph Wall after a little bit of a down couple of games he'd lost three out of four at a big game on Friday against Detroit played well you know now

they have to resort to Matt Murray is that the best scenario no but, but Solars will come back and it will be fine. So I think the Leafs are set up to be able to handle losing Austin Matthews for a few games. Let him rest. Let him get healthy. You don't need to push him in December right now going into January. And I know the conversation is already, what about the Four Nations face-off? What do you do with Austin Matthews? Well, I think Austin Matthews has to really look in the mirror and say, okay, I'll probably be in the Olympics next year.

Do I need to worry about this Four Nations face-off when the Leafs really need me? I think that is probably the most important thing right now for Matthews and the Leafs is to realize, make a game plan so we can be healthy for February, March, April and more. Marty the New York Rangers are absolutely stunningly bad to me I don't know how they get there but they're there what's your read on what's going on there? Well the Rangers had a bad defensive structure going on and and and it has worked for Peter Lavivielle for many many years where they just play strict man-to-man in the defensive zone and you know you rely on your goaltending to bail you out and shisterkin has done that and johnson quick quick has done that

for you know the early part of the season but they're missing a big piece and i feel like they're missing that shutdown defenseman that Peter Laviolette always had when he was with Nashville and Roman Yossi you know in in Washington he had you know a John Carlson but he had a really good good group of defense that could handle that I don't know that he has that in New York especially when Keandre Miller is not playing you don't have Jacob Trubo anymore. Adam Fox is not that guy. Ryan Lindgren was hurt for a little bit. You're struggling.

You're struggling on the back end. So now they've adjusted the way they play in the defensive zone, but they don't know what to do to be able to generate offense. And so it's, you know, now you're dealing with another problem. You're not scoring enough. You're getting blanked. You're losing back-to-back games to the Devils. That big rivalry.

So it's been bad, but I feel like LaViolette at least has been trying to change what was the problem in the first half of the season, but now they're dealing with the offense getting to be at a stall. but now they're dealing with the offense getting to be at a stall. Marty, Alex Ovechkin misses five-plus weeks with a broken leg and then comes back, and he's got a couple of goals. He's resumed the race to beat the great Wayne Gretzky's all-time goal-scoring record. I know he scored a few goals against you along the way to add to his total.

How do you like his chances to get the 25 required in the remainder of this season and break Gretzky's record before the season's over? I didn't think he was going to get it done before the season started. With the way that he started last year, I know he had a strong second half, but I was looking at the Washington Cavaliers as, this is going to be a tough year. And then he had 15 and 18 games before getting hurt. And he was playing the

right wing. He's usually a left winger, and now he's playing the right wing with Stroman, Alexey Protas. And you're like, what is happening here? I get it. The Washington Capitals are winning. So now that's allowing Ovechkin to score empty net goals. But empty net goals are goals. And Wayne Grep, he had a ton of empty net goals. But empty net goals are goals.

And Wayne Gretzky had a ton of empty netters as well. So they all count. And his first game back, he gets an empty net goal. You guys saw it. So that all works. But the best part about Ovechkin is that his injury was a bone, a smaller bone in the leg. It's not the tibia.

It wasn't the femur. It wasn't an ankle. It wasn't a knee. It was a bone. It heals. You the leg. It's not the tibia. It wasn't the femur. It wasn't an ankle. It wasn't a knee. It was a bone. It heals. You're good. You're good to go. And he's good to go right now.

And he's skated a ton. So I didn't expect him to go back and score a couple of goals in two games. But I also didn't think he was going to get the rust, right, that you may have when you have a more significant injury. So I think that now, well, I would love it to, like the last two weeks of the season, have that chase. I have the, you know, Wayne Gretzky and the league follow Ovechkin around. And I believe that four of the last five games for the Washington Capitals

this year are actually on national TV in the U.S., ESPN and TNT. So I'm like, hey, that's what they're lining up for. I want to see him get it done this year. This thing is on pace to get it done in February. No, it's not going to happen in February, but maybe last couple weeks of the season it'd be awesome. Marty, when you look at the wild card race, I mean, Boston is sitting there third in the division at 44,

Tampa at 42, Ottawa at 40, and then there are all those teams that sit underneath the cut line. But clearly, as Montreal can show you, what you need is a good two-week run, 42, Ottawa at 40, and then all those teams that sit underneath the cut line. But clearly, as Montreal can show you, what you need is a good two-week run and you can improve your stock. How do you see that race developing? Well, I'm not impressed with Boston. Look, they don't shoot. They don't have a ton of offense.

With Joe Sacco now there, it's all about let's defend, let's defend, let's defend. So I don't know that that can continue to work for the Boston Bruins. They're a minus 14 in goal differential. I'm looking at the standings right now. The only team in the Eastern Conference that is in a playoff spot that has a plus minus, a minus in goal differential. So I don't thinkoston is going to stay there pittsburgh impressed me in their push of late um but you know can they keep it going do they

have the goaltending columbus is fun to watch but the same thing with columbus can they keep it going with the young guys in the goaltending so if you have to ask me, I think Boston is probably the more likely to come out. Ottawa, Allmark, when is he returned? Can they stay afloat without him being in that? I think Tampa is in. I think Florida, Toronto, New Jersey, Washington, Carolina are going to be in. So now it's just a matter of can the Rangers get hot? Can the Pittsburgh Penguins maybe catch Boston? Those are the teams that are in the mix, in my opinion.

Pittsburgh Penguins maybe catch Boston. Those are the teams that are in the mix, in my opinion. Marty, you look out west, and last night they were billing it a bit of a Calder Trophy showdown between the Sharks and Macklin Celebrini, who is the favorite to win NHL Rookie of the Year, and Dustin Wolfe of the Calgary Flames, the great young goaltender who led the Flames to a 3-1 win, made some big saves, including a big one late on Celebrini. What do you make of this, Dustin Wolfe, and his chances of making a run at the Calder? I think what is going to be hard for Dustin Wolfe

is the fact that he has to get wins, right? Like, goaltenders, if you are going to be in that conversation, you have to have a really great record. Your stats line has to be good, and your team probably should make the playoffs. A player that scores 40 goals or a rookie that has 30 goals and 75 points, even if the team doesn't make the playoffs, they may look at it and say, oh, that player was fantastic.

And it's not his fault. I think the goaltender has to have a team that is going to help him get to the playoff. Maybe Wolfe is the one that, if I look at the top three right now, I'm looking at Celebrini, I'm looking at Mitzkoff, I probably put Lane Hudson and Dustin Wolfe in that same tide for third, right? And Mitch Koff is going to play Celebrini on New Year's Eve. The Flyers are in San Jose tomorrow, so that will be fun as well. So we've had those internal battles, but it's going to be hard to beat Celebrini.

I had Mitch Koff as my preseason favorite to win the Calder. But you watch Celebrini play, man. He is so exciting to watch. The speed through neutral zone, the skill level. I think that kid is special. Can you imagine he could be with Team Canada at the World Juniors? That's just nuts. That would be a sight. They could use his goal scoring.

Marty, thanks very much, and Happy New Year. Happy New Year. Yeah, absolutely. same to you guys thank you marty braun tsn hockey analyst msg sabers analyst as well