The Leafs enter their game against Montreal on a three game slide, having fallen to third in the Atlantic Division, staring at the prospect of another first round matchup against the Boston Bruins. Meanwhile, Montreal has won two straight after a brief slide and currently occupy the first Wild Card spot, 3 points back of the Leafs with one more game played.
Lines based on practice, assuming Jake Gardiner will play.
Leafs will have an extra D on the ice in warm-up as a precaution but Babcock says Gardiner is expecting to play
— Mark Masters (@markhmasters) February 23, 2019
Zach Hyman - John Tavares - Mitch Marner
Andreas Johnsson - Auston Matthews - Kasperi Kapanen
Patrick Marleau - William Nylander - Connor Brown
Par Lindholm - Frederik Gauthier - Tyler Ennis
Defence Pairings
Morgan Rielly - Ron Hainsey
Jake Muzzin - Nikita Zaitsev
Jake Gardiner - Travis Dermott
Frederik Andersen
Garret Sparks
Jonathan Drouin - Phillip Danault - Brendan Gallagher
Tomas Tatar - Max Domi - Andrew Shaw
Paul Byron - Jesperi Kotkaniemi - Joel Armia
Arturri Lehkonen - Nate Thompson - Charles Hudon
Victor Mete - Shea Weber
Mike Reilly - Jeff Petry
Brett Kulak - Jordie Benn
The most interesting matchup to me will be the Habs third line against the Leafs third line.