COLUMBUS, OHIO—The one thing that seems to have confounded Maple Leafs coach Mike Babcock — though he won’t stop looking for solutions — is back-to-back games.
After looking as good as they have all year in trouncing the Islanders on Tuesday, the Maple Leafs were as flat as they’ve been in dropping a 5-2 decision to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Wednesday night.
They also lost rookie Mitch Marner, who didn’t finish the game after a second-period hit from Boone Jenner. He tried on two occasions to come back, leaving both times in frustration.
The Leafs have 18 of these back-to-back series on the schedule, and face another pair this weekend against Ottawa and Carolina. Babcock has worked the team hard one day and then skipped morning skates on gamedays. He has searched for the right backup goalie, settling lately on former Blue Jacket Curtis McElhinney after cameos by Jhonas Enroth and Antoine Bibeau.
Still, the magic has yet to be discovered that would allow the Leafs to come out on top regularly in the second of back-to-back games.
The Leafs are okay in the first game: 9-2-2. But they are now 4-8-1 in the second. With five more of these to go, Babcock will almost certainly be looking for a solution.
Columbus had a four-goal lead by the midway part of the second period before Babcock pressed the button on the blender and came up with new lines. Each member of the energy line found two new partners. Centre Ben Smith worked with James van Riemsdyk and William Nylander. Josh Leivo moved to the wing with Nazem Kadri and Leo Komarov. Matt Martin was on the left wing with Tyler Bozak and Mitch Marner. The all-rookie line of Auston Matthews centring Connor Brown and Zach Hyman remained in tact.
It paid off a bit, with Kadri scoring to cut the Blue Jackets lead to 4-1 at 17:28 of the second. Kadri scored again — Leivo did the hard work — to cut the lead in half six minutes into the third, but that was as close as the Leafs would get on the night.
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