Babcock and Tavares don’t see eye to eye on important game factor

It did not take long for John Tavares to get fans excited about the Toronto Maple Leafs’ upcoming season. With the start of the preseason and the action happening during the exhibition games, fans are starting to get a sense of how Tavares will play and what the Leafs’ power play will look like.

We can tell you right now, that latter aspect of the game looks different from Tavares’ point of view and from what head coach Mike Babcock has in mind. It appears that the superstar forward and his new head coach do not have the same plan for the power-play heading into the 2018-19 season. 

On Thursday, Babcock revealed to TSN what that top power play unit will look and where Tavares will be playing might surprise Leafs fans like it did Babcock.

“When we were recruiting Johnny I asked him what spot he wanted to play on the power play and he said, ‘net front,’ and that surprised me, to be honest with you,” admitted Babcock. “I didn’t know that’s what he was going to say, because we were going to move (Auston Matthews) there.”

As per TSN’s Mark Masters, Babcock was forced to change things up when Tavares surprised him by claiming he was to be in front of the net on the power play.

We can understand why Tavares wants that spot: he scored from that position in his first preseason game on Tuesday, as you can see in the video above. 

“I played a lot throughout the middle of the ice last year whether it was the front of the net or the high-slot area,” Tavares said. “I was around the net a lot more than maybe in years past. But even some of the units I played on in New York, we had a lot of guys being able to kind of rotate in and out of positions so maybe not always right in front of the net, but I’ve been around the net, kind of off to the side, some down-low areas. But in front, I wouldn’t say I’ve been assigned that role full-time in the past so it’s definitely an adjustment, but I like to think I can make it.”

The Leafs had the second-best power play unit in the NHL the last two seasons, so this disagreement could in fact be a blessing and bring them atop everyone else in the league.