In case you haven't noticed, Jack Campbell is rolling lately. The Leafs netminder has been above a .930sv% his past 2 games. That alone is a good sign that he's getting back towards the top of his game. More impressive however, is the fact that Campbell has won 7, yes 7 straight starts. This is Campbell's longest winning streak of the season, and it couldn't have come at a better time.
With the Leafs playing the best hockey we've seen in over a decade, goaltending has been the biggest question mark surrounding the team. New signing Petr Mrazek has had a shambolic season between injuries and subpar play. Campbell started the season on a tear that had him on the shortlist for Vezina consideration before his play dipped mid-season. Shortly after that Campbell suffered a rib injury that kept him out of the lineup for 3 weeks. Erik Kallgren was called up to help out and played well, but he's cooled off after his hot start. All in all, its been a chaotic season for the Leafs between the pipes. The situation as it stands is tenuous at best. All of the Leafs hopes rest on Jack Campbell's shoulders, and since his return from injury, he's taken the ball and run with it.
Looking over Campbell's stats since his return it seems that his best games are the ones where he sees more shots, his lowest sv% game was agains the Dallas Stars, where he allowed 3 goals on just 18 shots, his best game was last night's contest against the Flyers, Campbell stopped 37 of 39 shots against for a sparkling .949sv%. More work seems to work better for Campbell, and against teams like Tampa, Boston and Florida, he's likely to have a fairly heavy workload.
As our regular readers have most likely noticed, everyone is focused on the playoffs. As great as this season has been, it means nothing if they can't do something in the playoffs. As it stands, they will likely face off against Tampa in round one. If they want to have a hope of knocking off the two time champs, Jack Campbell will need to outduel the reigning Conn Smythe winner in Andrei Vasilevskiy. His recent run of play has been enough to convince this writer that, at the very least, they've got a shot.
