NHL Odds: Will Brad Marchand have more points or penalty minutes against the Toronto Maple Leafs?
The Boston Bruins and Toronto Maple Leafs renew their historic rivalry on Saturday night in Leaf Land. There’s a lot of history between the current iteration of these Originals Six teams that features fights, playoff collapses and questionable licking. The player who is generally most involved in the latest generation of this rivalry is Boston pest Brad Marchand, someone who isn’t afraid to beat you with his stick, his fists or his tongue.
So, will Marchand have more points or penalty minutes on Saturday in Toronto?
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Marchand the pest
Marchand wasted no time living up to his reputation as someone who plays on the edge when these teams met for the first time this season on November 2. He picked up an assist in Boston’s 3-2 shootout win, but his bigger impact wasn’t on the scoresheet. The Bruins’ captain was tangled up with Toronto’s Timothy Liljegren when the Leafs defenceman fell awkwardly into the boards and suffered an ankle injury. Marchand wasn’t penalized on the play, while Liljegren hasn’t played since, and only resumed skating this week.
While the camera angle makes it tough to tell exactly what happened, some people think it was a slew-foot, some people think it was a can-opener and some people think it was an unfortunate fall. The one thing most people agree on, is Toronto’s embarrassing lack of response. Leafs players essentially left Marchand alone after the hit and took a lot of heat from the fans and media after the game. Marchand is a player with a history of slew-foot suspensions who laid a very questionable hit on a young Toronto defenceman which resulted in an injury and no one on the Leafs stepped up.
We’re in a different era of hockey with fighting almost entirely gone from the game, but you can guarantee players in the Toronto dressing room heard the criticism over their lack of response and it will be in every players’ thoughts on Saturday. Marchand will have a short leash.
Suspensions, suspensions, suspensions
The hit on Liljegren is far from the first time Marchand has been involved in a questionable play. In fact, he’s the most suspended player in NHL history. Marchand has been suspended eight times in his NHL career, forfeiting over $1.4 million in salary. He’s been suspended for everything from illegal checks to the head to slew-footing and he’s been fined nine other times.
Marchand has been suspended twice for slew-footing and received a fine for a third incident, but one of the most bizarre tactics of the Boston agitator is his history of licking opponents…seriously. In the 2018 Stanley Cup playoffs, during Game 1 of Boston and Toronto’s first-round series, Marchand was caught on camera licking Leafs forward Leo Komarov’s face. It was a followup to an incident that happened earlier in the season when Marchand leaned in to kiss Komarov on the cheek rather than fight him. Again, this really happened.
After Toronto’s epic 2018 playoff collapse in Game 7, Marchand actually received a warning from the NHL for licking Lightning forward Ryan Callahan in the second-round. And while Marchand has pretty much put his tongue away during NHL games, the point is he’s an agitator who will do anything to get under opponents skin.
How the stats stack up
So, will Marchand have more points or penalty minutes when he faces the Leafs on Saturday? Well, let’s look at how the stats stack up.
| Brad Marchand vs. Toronto Maple Leafs | GP | G | A | P | +/- | PIM |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 50 | 18 | 30 | 48 | +19 | 44 |
It’s a very close split on total points vs. penalty minutes for Marchand’s career against Toronto. He’s played 50 games against the Leafs, recording 18 goals and 30 assists for 48 points. He’s plus-19 in those games and he has 44 penalty minutes.
In more recent history, Marchand has been in the lineup for nine of the last 10 games Boston has played Toronto, dating to the 2019-20 season. Over that stretch, he has four goals, six assists and 16 penalty minutes. In his last nine games against Toronto, there were four times Marchand recorded more points than penalty minutes and two times he had more PIMs than points. He didn’t have any points or penalty minutes in one game and he had two points and two penalty minutes in two separate games.
There’s no need to point out how much time we wasted digging into these numbers, we already know and it’s possibly the most math anyone on the editorial staff has done since high school. Besides, it’s Leafs vs. Bruins, you know fans will care.
Points vs. PIMs verdict?
The stats say it’s more likely Marchand will have more points than penalty minutes against Toronto on Saturday. But still, stats only take you so far in sports, there’s always multiple factors at play. It seems very possible someone on the Leafs won’t give Marchand a choice and he could end up with five minutes for fighting, which would almost guarantee a win for the PIMs.