OverDrive - Corrado on the Maple Leafs' series lead, Domi's overtime heroics and Stolarz leading the way

Episode Date: April 23, 2025

TSN Hockey Analyst Frank Corrado joined OverDrive to discuss the headlines around the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the Maple Leafs' victory against the Senators, Max Domi's overtime winner, Anthony Stolarz leading the way, the power play strength for the group, the mentality going into the games in Ottawa and more.

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Join today and be part of something amazing. Here he is, Frankie Carrotto. What do you make of that, Frank? Any chance you want to fire down to the Hall of Fame on Saturday? Dude, I'm mad if I got to go south of the 401 these days. I'm not even joking. Like, there's no chance I want. I don't want anything to do with anything south of the four one unless i say i really hear us

yeah haha i don't know about the highway seven that's true that that's what's the topic i'm not brought that up because i want to i want to issue a thank you to the league for the seven thirty star yesterday because you never got anywhere close I Flew down the parkway yesterday. I was in the building for the anthems

Harmonicas, I was waiting for the harmonicas. I don't I'm sorry. I don't believe that I've never saw you leave the building I've never looked out on Macau and I go that guy's parking that rink at 845 I'm telling you man was in the shoulder. I guarantee you, you're drivin' like Gordon Miller. Totally legal. It was not the old, there's the go bus lane that you always see one guy and a tourist or something flying down. Because everyone knows the transition in the city.

If you've ever gone 401 onto the DVP, it's insane to just transition onto the parkway. There was nothing. I made that turn goin' 80 onto the parkway. There was nothing I Made that turn going 80 onto the parkway. I've never done that my life and I was going a hundred all the way down I never stopped. It was unbelievable. I was pulling into my spot. You know where it is I'm still not telling anyone at 7 so greasy man. Just got a big spot I get it out so easily Amazing there is no better feeling haze you just experienced it last night man just got a big spot, I get in and out so easily and I'm not telling that. It was amazing. There is no better feeling, Hayes, you just experienced it last night.

When you turn onto that parkway and it's somewhat clear. Amazing. Like the DVP, because you feel like what's wrong here. Because that's always like in your mind you're going, I got to get downtown from the studio or whatever. That's 40 minutes. Yes. You're going I got to get downtown from the studio or whatever That's 40 minutes and 18 minutes is sitting there going around that one bend as you get halfway down That's right people just want to slow down and I don't know look at the trees or whatever

But you there's no better feeling on the DVP when you see road ahead of you Well, you are just like I top of it I thought I saw someone hit in a t p five at the noldo like you know it than all this right off the side of the park where there are like i think someone's out there playing golf so i'm like this world's are colliding here it's a beautiful thing uh... but i made it and it was great and uh...

but what do you what do you take out of last night frank like where does your head go first when you you consider where the lease or or at through two games but specifically what happened last night. I mean, there's a few things. First of all, the Leafs, it's almost been skewed by the Leafs playing with the lead in this series because they get off to these early leads and then the game becomes like a, like let's just trap it up and let's kind of congest things, let's pack it in around

the house. In Ottawa, of course, they have the puck, they're playing with it in the offensive zone, Toronto blocks a million shots and you know that's where I think that the five-on-five conversation comes alive for the Ottawa Senators where it's like you know we're doing some things, we're happy with how we're playing at five-on-five, we're getting chances. Well that's because Toronto is not at a two-nothing lead looking to go three four five which is what they they would have done in the past and maybe had been exposed for opening things up a little

bit so Toronto playing with the lead is is big Anthony Stolar's like you know we can do the history lesson on the goaltenders of years past for Toronto but it's like you know Freddie Anderson when he was more in his prime Although he is on fire right now in Carolina. He didn't have this Developed and mature of a team in front of him, you know, Jack Campbell Ilya Samson off pinch hitting Joseph wall like it never had this feel of Anthony Stolar's where Yes confidence in the guy's ability, but looking like a monster and not letting in a leaky goal, like just making the saves you're supposed to make and

then a few along the way that you're not necessarily supposed to. And like Noodles talks about, like the timely save. And the power play. Like the power play just gets right to work. There's no messing around. It's a face-off win and it's like a set play that they've drawn up and they work it really well and Matthew Nise plays a big part in all of that because having that big extra body in front of the net has forced whatever defenseman it is whether it's Shabbat or Jensen or Sanderson

to make a decision and We're seeing like if you want to stay with Nise and be all over him well now your skate gets twisted up and it goes in off your skate and in the net or if you want to be all over nice it opens up John Tavares for a tip and a rebound goal like there the power play has a plan and it's executing like very very quickly is that just bad mojo do you think Frankie I mean you killed penalties Hayes I'm sure you killed penalties as the fenceman. Like, me and Johnny were kind of, we had differing opinions on it where he was like,

you can't chase as much, and I'm like, I think when a power play scores on you that early, you gotta go into attack mode as a killer and maybe don't let them set up or have any kind of time at all. Like, if you watch Jake Sanderson, and it's a fluky goal, Tavares just threw it on net

But he's five feet away from him. He just kind of stayed there's no pressure at all So when you're on a streak like that, like if they're sitting the penalty killers are in a room What do you think their penalty killer coach is saying? Because or is it just a bad streak first thing is you got to win a draw. Yeah To that a Amen to that. Win a face off and like John Tavares has been digging in and he's like Claude Giroud is a good face off guy. But with that being said oh I would say it this way. You have one bad game in a series on the penalty kill. You don't necessarily abandon what your scheme is, what your philosophy is, you say, this is how we kill penalties,

we're going to do it. Now you have two where you get exposed. I think you have to have that conversation and say, we have to make an adjustment based on what Toronto is doing because they did it to us two games in a row now. And if it happens three games, we're basically being negligent in the fact that we're getting exposed for things. So maybe you do have to be overly aggressive. That plays into Toronto's hand because if you haven't done that all year and now you're

just running around, Toronto's got good players, they'll snap it around, they'll put it through your skates, they'll put it through your stick. Now that's an uncomfortable situation for you, but you have to put yourself there because you're getting exposed otherwise. I think that's part of the game within the game in all these series, but Toronto's got the one up in a lot of different categories right now. That's where I was going to go, Frankie. You can talk about winning or losing a draw, but I would say when you look at penalty kills

when they're passive, and we had Gio in studio with us yesterday, and what did he say to you and I, Hayes, where he said a penalty kill, when they get scored on, it gets in their head a little bit. Like they sit on the bench, and if you feel like, God, I missed that one, or I missed my assignment there, he goes, like confidence is a fragile thing, especially that game one really messed with their psyche

a little bit. So then, game two, they only have one chance and it's in the back of the net pretty quickly. And like I pointed out, I thought it was a bad bounce for Omar because you could see Jensen tries to make the, I'm going to the back door, I'm going to take that away and it hits him and goes in the net. But in the end, that penalty kill I think is is struggling they're too passive and you know what you're right if you're too aggressive on five forwards that want to move the puck around I just I don't know if you'd like

to go down swinging being aggressive or going down swinging or not swinging and just standing there watching it go in. It's gotta be aggressive. Always aggressive. Always. But that's why Britton-Horse penalty killing Carolina. It's the Peter LaVulette model and they are going to pressure you all over the ice. Any skilled player no matter how good you are, if you were pressured especially in any situation where they have the puck on their backhand and they're blind to the play you attack every single time. Right. Yes.'s exactly it I mean Elaine Vino had this thing where he called it like eyeballs and you know behinds let's say right like yes yes if you're looking at I've heard it yes yeah exactly it's like it's like a whatever it's a say and it was

always like if you see eyeballs well now we got a we got to not be passive but we're eyeing up in that situation we're eyes to eyes because you're looking at me you're in complete control you see that guys behind and you're going and then the next guy's going and then the next guy's going and it's like that's when you apply the pressure and listen I think Ottawa would be doing that just like everyone else there's no big secret really what it comes down to is a lot of these teams kill the same way. A lot of these teams do the same kind of schemes. It's how well do you execute them and can you get a bounce or two along the way?

Can you get a save along the way? Does Toronto bobble a puck? How many times have we seen Bob the Toronto in years past on the power play, they do everything they want to do. And when it comes to pulling the trigger, for some reason it bobbled on Austin Matthews and he hit the glass with a puck. That has happened so many times for Toronto, not happening right now. I don't know, sometimes you get the breaks, sometimes you earn the breaks, but Ottawa, if you're going to go down swinging, go down being aggressive, don't go down being passive. Detroit had a passive penalty kill this year, it was 68%, it was terrible. And Carolina, to O's point, Carolina had the best penalty kill, it was uber aggressive.

So you can kind of look at how trends go around the league. And last night again, the Leafs only had one power play. Yes, the night before it got crazy and they had six and they burned them, but they're four for seven on the power play. The numbers are outrageous considering what we've seen from the least power play in the past. And, you know, you look at that, the Matthews line, I'm curious where you stand on this, Frankie, all of us. I think, you know, again, I think you bring up a great point. They've been up to nothing so quick. The game, the complexion of the game changes. of the game changes the you could do the messaging from Peru Bay is changing the mentality is going to change you don't want to make mistakes and I think the

Leafs have done a really good job of simplifying games and pushing stuff to the outside not giving up odd man rushes for the most part and I think the Matthews line probably symbolizes that because they really weren't they weren't dangerous last night but they they also, I thought, they kind of set a tone for how this team is supposed to play in moments like that, which is really what you need from your captain, from your leader. We talk about 69 goals and the highest paid player in the league and heart trophies and rockets.

Ultimately, the only thing that guy needs,thews in particular he needs to win he needs to be on the winning teams and i think he's done that with the winning habits quote unquote it's just not that sexy through two games uh... but on the flip side of that if he turns it up if i'm auto and i'm looking at him thinking this guy could burn me at any point that's a scary proposition

yeah and haze you know what i don't even know if it's a matter of turning it up. I think it's just a matter of like the team has a lead, we're in a comfortable spot and Toronto so many times in the past was like we need more. We need to press for more and we are not satisfied with this. We want to win this game 4-0, 5-0 and I'm not saying like you have to sit back and just be on your heels the rest of the night and let the Other team continue to attack you but there's something to be said for just We're doing what's right in the moment and we're not trying to push We're trying to win a hockey game and I think the Matthews line

Like that's that's where they fall into that category right now where the team gets off to an early lead and it's like well We don't have to open things up up we don't have to take unnecessary risk you know if the puck is along the wall in the offensive zone we're not like Mitch Marner's not just shoveling it into the middle because he feels like he urgently has to make something happen right away on this touch on the puck like there's an element of of patience to their game and if they get into a situation going to you know these two games in Ottawa when they're if they're down a goal if they're down two goals we probably see that that risk factor come back in and it's like okay now they're cooking they're really pressing but maybe that's part of the

the learning curve in the maturity for this group where it's like we just need to do what matters for winning this game and that is the first priority as far as what we're doing. In year nine it's got to be moving forward. All right, Frankie. Good stuff, pal. Thank you for doing this.

All right, boys. Have a good one. There he is, Frankie Corrado. That just happened with me, Vashi Capellos. Canada Decides 2025. Stay informed with my exclusive iHeartRadio podcast, available Friday afternoon, straight through till election day and beyond.

I'll have your weekly highlights and my unvarnished analysis of the campaign of a lifetime. The candidates, the quotes, the polls, and the momentum. That just happened with Vashikapelos, Canada Decides 2025. Fresh every Friday. Stream on your schedule with the free iHeartRadio app.