How the Leafs kept Kessel away from Chara It took exactly one game for Randy Carlyle to realize the Toronto Maple Leafs had a huge problem on their hands with the Phil Kessel versus Zdeno Chara matchup. It took just one more for his adjustments to pay off. While the story over the last two years when it comes to the Leafs facing the Boston Bruins has often been about Chara's dominance, in Game 2 on Saturday, Carlyle managed to change that narrative for a night by getting his star away from the big man just long enough to make an impact. During a lopsided 4-1 loss in Game 1 earlier in the week, Kessel had played a total of 10 minutes at 5-on-5 against Chara - nearly 90 per cent of his ice time - and was wholly ineffective by just about any measurement. Toronto had just four shots on goal with Kessel on the ice, and Boston outshot the Leafs 10-4 and out attempted them an incredible 19-5 with their top scorer in play. Contrast that with Toronto's 4-2 win in Game 2, where Kessel still spent 9.5 minutes on the ice against Chara, but in a game largely free of special teams play, only 70 per cent of his minutes at even strength were lined up against him. That may not sound like much of a shift but swapping Kessel with Matt Frattin throughout the night gave him four Chara-free minutes and some extra freedom (and energy) against his former team. It also provided enough of an opening that he scored the winning goal on a breakaway moments after Chara had left the ice early in the third period. And Kessel's game was drastically better beyond even just the goal. The Leafs matched the Bruins in shots at 12-12 with him on the ice and actually came out ahead if you factor in missed shots (15-13) as a way of measuring offensive opportunities. Several Toronto forwards ,meanwhile, remarked how all the adjustments kept them all in the game, as they had to remain aware on the bench in case Carlyle tapped them on the back unexpectedly to pull off his game plan. They all seemed to like the idea of finding a way to get Kessel on the scoresheet in the series, too. "We were just trying to get Phil a couple shifts away from Chara," Lupul explained. If we had the puck in the offensive zone, we were going to play together, but if we were in the neutral zone, we were trying to get him on the ice against a different defenceman. Randy is always juggling a lot, especially on the road, and as a player, you've just got to be alert on the bench and know the particular matchup he wants for you and try to outplay the guy across from you. They did - and they won the game as a result. But one interesting factor with the Leafs success in Game 2 was that, even though they won, very little of it came with Chara on the ice. While the Leafs did capitalize with him in the box on Joffrey Lupul's first goal on the power play, Chara was out there for two even strength goals for and none against, adding to his many dominant performances in that department against Toronto in their 12 meetings the past two seasons. To illustrate that, here's a comparison of what happened with Kessel and Chara on the ice in the series" first two games, keeping in mind that both players had more even strength ice time in Game 2 due to fewer penalties being called: Player Goals for Goals against Shots for Shots against Att. for Att. against Game 1 Kessel Game 2 Chara While the Leafs didn't score and still allowed a lot of shots on goal when Chara was on the ice (19), they also generated more opportunities of their own, part of a trend in the game that came as a result of far better management of the puck overall. (Where Toronto really victimized the Bruins was against its second pairing of Johnny Boychuk and Dennis Seidenberg, two of the only Boston players that were outchanced on the night. They're unlikely to play together much the rest of the way, however, with Andrew Ference returning to the lineup from suspension.) Beyond simply getting Kessel away from Chara, the other unique thing about Carlyle's usage of his top scorer was just how favourable his minutes were. In Game 1, Kessel had been on the ice for only seven faceoffs at even strength and four of those were in the defensive zone as the coach attempted to make use of centre Tyler Bozak's skills on the draw to get them out of trouble. But in Game 2, with Kessel playing far more of his minutes without Bozak (50 per cent, up from almost nothing in Game 1), he was on the ice for 17 draws and just two were in the defensive zone. That meant Kessel was out there for 10 of the 18 offensive zone draws the Leafs had in the game, which is exactly what a coach should want with a player who's offensively dangerous and defensively suspect. (This was obviously helped by the fact the Leafs broke out of their zone far better and had much more offensive zone time in general in Game 2. Overall, Toronto earned 10 more offensive zone faceoffs than in Game 1.) Faceoffs Player Defensive Zone Neutral Zone Offensive Zone Difference Faceoffs Defensive Zone Neutral Zone Offensive Zone Difference This sort of heavy line matching and zone start usage wasn't typically part of Carlyle's arsenal this season - Kessel oddly started more shifts in the defensive zone than the offensive zone during the regular season and was never separated from Bozak - but it played a big role in his team's win on Saturday and will likely now be a factor the rest of this series. "This is really the first time that we've really went as hard [with matching] as that," Carlyle admitted. What will be fascinating to watch in Games 3 and 4 back in Toronto is (a) how Bruins coach Claude Julien adapts to this shift and (b) how having home-ice advantage allows Carlyle to get even more of these matchups he wants. The Kessel-versus-Chara dynamic has always been so lopsided that it has been such a huge part of Boston's success over the Leafs in recent years, but with Kessel potentially pressed into more favourable, offence-only situations, it's possible he becomes much more of a factor. For that, credit the Leafs coaching staff for taking full advantage of a rare two-day break in their playoff schedule to rethink how to tackle a team like the Bruins and how best to free up Kessel to do what he does best.