It’s not often an afternoon tilt between a division leader and a basement squad winds up a thriller. But Sunday in Pittsburgh, that’s exactly what happened.
The Penguins and Toronto Maple Leafs put on a show, barrelling through a wild, back-and-forth 11-goal track meet that ended in a William Nylander overtime clincher and a narrow 6-5 victory for the Leafs.
Theatrics and fireworks aside, if you’re Toronto, it should be tough to walk away from this one with too much satisfaction. For a club with real contender aspirations, it was about as unsteady and inconsistent a game as you could piece together.
After taking a quick two-goal lead five minutes into the meeting, the Maple Leafs seemed to be off and running, dominating the Pens in the manner expected by most, given where these two clubs sit in the standings. Then it all went off the rails for the blue and white as Pittsburgh came back with two quick goals of its own to knot things up midway through the opening period.
From there, it was a mess of a game. A power-play marker from Sidney Crosby gave Pittsburgh a lead by the time that first period was over. Auston Matthews pulled the Maple Leafs level again early in the second, only to see Pittsburgh’s Bryan Rust answer 10 minutes later. Toronto capped the middle frame in frantic fashion, with John Tavares and Matthew Knies potting back-to-back final-minute stunners, taking their side into the intermission with a one-goal lead — only to see Pittsburgh’s Rickard Rakell even the score again 10 seconds into the third period.
In the end, a moment of quality from Nylander finally ended the thing and earned Toronto the win.
“It’s not how we wanted to draw it up, but that happens sometimes,” assessed head coach Craig Berube in his post-game comments. “We made a couple mistakes and put ourselves in a little bit of a hole, but guys stayed with it, climbed out of it, found a way to get the win, which was great.”
Added Matthews: “I think that’s been the case most of the season, just finding ways to win. Sometimes it’s ugly, sometimes it’s pretty. Sometimes you play a near-perfect game, and sometimes you deserve to lose and you still win.
“I think we’ve found ways to win in different situations and different games, and that’s the most important part.”
Resilience aside, the bigger-picture issue is grounded in where these Maple Leafs want to be: among the league’s genuine contenders. While these Penguins still have some worthy star power dotted throughout their lineup, they also sit 23 rungs below Toronto on the league’s standings. The Maple Leafs rank sixth in the East with a plus-22 goal differential compared to the Penguins at minus-50, which is good for second-last overall.
That in mind, grinding out a hard-fought, nail-biter of a win seems to raise just as many question marks as it does convey something of the Maple Leafs’ ability to win in different situations.
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Spreading the wealth
If there are any positives to be drawn from the fact that it took six goals, and an extra frame, for the Maple Leafs to take down these Penguins, it’s perhaps the fact that they got some offence from all corners of the lineup.
Twelve different Maple Leafs finished the night with a point on the board, with Nylander, Auston Matthews and Matthew Knies the only players to contribute more than one.
The six tallies came from six different contributors, too. In the early going, it was depth players Max Domi and Conor Timmins chipping in with a couple early goals, aided by Nick Robertson, Bobby McMann and Pontus Holmberg. In the middle frame, it was Matthews striking early, with help from Mitch Marner, and then fellow top-sixers Tavares and Knies coming up clutch with a pair of late-period breakaways, the first of those sprung by a fantastic Jake McCabe stretch pass.
Knies’ buzzer-beater breakaway — the puck crossed the goal line with 0.1 left on the clock — was surely the wildest moment of a game not short on them.
“Honestly, I didn’t really know how much time was on the clock,” Knies said. “They were yelling ‘Shoot!’ [from the bench]pretty early, like at the red line honestly, and I was kind of in shock — I’m glad I didn’t shoot it at the red line.
“I just kind of went for it, tried to shoot it as quick as I could. Fortunately, I think it was 0.1 or 0.2 [seconds left on the clock], so it was really close, but it was good.”
Defensive woes
On the other side of the puck, it was a rougher affair.
Chalk this one up as an afternoon to forget for Morgan Rielly as the veteran defender’s stumbles started early. On Pittsburgh’s first goal, Rielly was first beaten to the net by Pittsburgh’s Blake Lizotte, and then found himself screening netminder Joseph Woll on the ensuing shot. In all, Rielly was on the ice for three of Pittsburgh’s five even-strength goals.
It wasn’t an exceptional showing from Woll either, of course. It’s tough to hang too much blame on the netminder’s shoulders for the first tally, or the second — a wild bounce off the end boards that delivered the puck right to Rakell’s stick with an open net. The third, though — the one that gave Pittsburgh the lead by the end of the opening frame — is surely one his club would want back.
With the Pens having just potted twice to even the game, erasing any early momentum Toronto had built up, Pittsburgh was granted a power play, and set up a cycle in the Maple Leafs’ zone. The puck made its way to Crosby inside the left circle — the Penguins captain walked in, sized up his shot, and then whipped a low snipe through Woll’s five-hole. So caught off guard was the netminder, he seemed all but frozen as No. 87’s shot flew by him.
The back-end group as a whole left much to be desired on the Pens’ latter two goals, too, both of which saw Pittsburgh wingers — first Rust, then Rakell — fly down the right wing, cut across the net, and go forehand-backhand to beat Woll.
Had Toronto not pulled out the win in overtime, the last of those tallies would likely have spurred far more scrutiny, especially given the situation: in the opening minute of the third period, the Maple Leafs protecting a one-goal lead, and there’s Rakell, taking the puck off the period’s opening faceoff, outmuscling Matthews all the way down the right wing, and easily floating to the net to roof home the tying goal.
“I think we’ve got to be a little bit more structured,” Knies said of the squad’s overall defensive issues. “We can’t give up that many chances, that many goals. I think our special teams have to be a little bit better there. There’s just little things that we can clean up, I think, and make our next road trip successful.”
Milestones met
Zooming out from the moment-to-moment chaos of Sunday’s tilt, a number of players on both sides of the ice marked their places in franchise and league history.
Matthews’ second-period goal — the 390th of his career — moved him past Darryl Sittler for second on the Maple Leafs’ all-time goals list, with only Mats Sundin (420 goals) ahead of him.
“It’s nice — nice to be in the same sentence as a guy like Darryl Sittler,” Matthews said of the milestone. “Obviously a great Leaf, paved the way for some of us here today. So it’s a big honour to be in the same sentence.”
Earning an assist on Toronto’s third goal of the night, Marner moved to fifth place on the club’s all-time points list, his 714 points putting him just above former captain George Armstrong. Nylander’s overtime tally — the 252nd goal of his big-league career — moved him to 10th place on the club’s all-time goals list, and tied Matthews for the second-most regular-season overtime goals (13) in franchise history.
On the other side of the sheet, Crosby made some bigger-picture history. The Penguins captain put up the 1,049th assist of his career in Sunday’s game, moving past Gordie Howe for 10th on the NHL’s all-time list. No. 87 also bagged the 611th goal of his career, moving him past Bobby Hull to 18th on the league’s all-time list.
Despite the hectic affair that served as the backdrop for those milestone performances, the Maple Leafs’ win moves them to 38-20-2 on the season — and 27-0-0 when leading after two periods.
The club heads home to face San Jose in the second half of a back-to-back on Monday, fresh off a road trip that brought four straight wins.
