When Brandon Carlo was a rookie defenseman seven seasons ago, he spent much of his time partnered with Zdeno Chara. And of all the lessons he took from the Boston Bruins captain and future Hall of Famer, one of the most crucial was about big games, big matchups, big moments.
It was a lesson he pulled out Wednesday with the Bruins set to host the Toronto Maple Leafs at TD Garden on Thursday (7:30 p.m. ET; HULU, ESPN+, SNO, TVAS), and one that applies just as much to the Maple Leafs as to the Bruins.
“‘Big Z,’ playing with him my first year, he always wanted the top matchups and always wanted to go against the hardest players to go against,” Carlo said. “The competitive nature will kick in for all of us, I feel like. That’s a team, given the playoffs history, everything with that, we want to get up for and have a good game.”
The matchup between the Bruins and the Maple Leafs stands as one of the bigger ones of the early NHL season, a game between two teams with Stanley Cup aspirations who play in the meat grinder of an Atlantic Division.
“It’s important,” Toronto center Auston Matthews said of the first of four games this season between the teams. “These divisional games are always important, especially with how strong our division is. Teams are taking steps and Boston is off to a similar start to last year. It will be a good challenge for us.”
The Maple Leafs (5-3-1), who are coming off a 4-1 loss to the Los Angeles Kings on Tuesday, will attempt to deliver the Bruins (8-0-1) their first regulation loss of the season. Boston has topped even the 8-1-0 mark it started last season with en route to NHL regular-season records for wins (65) and points (135).
“It’s pretty obvious, pretty apparent [the Bruins] are once again the class of the League, certainly the division,” Toronto coach Sheldon Keefe said. “It’s a chance for us to go in and get a response. We’ve played well in Boston. A lot of that is because you know what you’re in for.”
They all do.
“The divisional games are always huge,” Carlo said. “You see those teams the most throughout the year. Those are always the easy ones to get up for because they have a lot of energy. But overall, I think it’s a great challenge for us. We obviously know they’re a huge firepower-on-offense team. I don’t know if we’ve faced anybody of that caliber yet on the offensive side of things.”
The Maple Leafs and Bruins each are averaging 3.22 goals per game, tied with the Winnipeg Jets for 13th in the NHL. Toronto boasts some of the top offensive players in the game, with forwards William Nylander (13 points; six goals, seven assists), John Tavares (12 points; five goals, seven assists) and Matthews (10 points; seven goals, three assists) each off to a hot start.
“Toronto is a great transitional team,” Boston coach Jim Montgomery said. “… I think the team that can possess the puck more tomorrow in the offensive zone is going to be the team that has a little bit of a leg up on the other team.”
Complicating matters for the Bruins is that their defenseman group is hobbled by the losses of Charlie McAvoy, who was suspended Tuesday for four games for an illegal check to the head of Florida Panthers defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson on Monday, and Matt Grzelcyk, who was placed on long-term injured reserve Wednesday with an upper-body injury sustained in that 3-2 overtime win against the Panthers. The Bruins are likely to be without defenseman Derek Forbort (undisclosed) as well.
They called up defensemen Mason Lohrei, Ian Mitchell and Parker Wotherspoon from Providence of the American Hockey League on Wednesday. Lohrei is expected to make his NHL debut Thursday, playing with Carlo.
“Regardless of our lineup, I feel like we recognize this year that we’ve got to play as a collective group,” Carlo said. “There’s not going to be any individual efforts. … It’s a hard gap to fill. It’s not going to be filled. There’s a reason why those players are so big within our lineup and so important. But you’ve got to play the hand that you’re dealt.”
The Bruins are allowing the fewest goals per game in the NHL by a wide margin (1.56), with both Linus Ullmark (1.77 goals-against average) and Jeremy Swayman (1.26) shining. The New York Rangers were second at 2.00. The Maple Leafs are allowing 3.11 goals per game, tied with three teams for the 15th most.
“They’re so good structure-wise, so I don’t think you’ll notice it too much,” Toronto defenseman Timothy Liljegren said. “Obviously some good players out of their lineup, but we just need to focus on our game I think.”
Coming after a 3-1-1 five-game road trip, the Maple Leafs were not pleased with the home loss to the Kings, especially with the tough slate ahead.
“There’s nothing we can do about that now,” Matthews said. “You have to take the good, and most of it was not very good, and we’ve got a really good challenge for us tomorrow in Boston, a team that has been playing really well, so we definitely need a response out of the guys in our room.”
NHL.com independent correspondent Dave McCarthy contributed to this report
