Auston Matthews joined some rare air with his 50th goal of the season Thursday against the Winnipeg Jets.
He accomplished the feat by burying an empty-net goal late in a win over the Winnipeg Jets.
The star centre is just the fourth player in Toronto Maple Leafs history to hit the milestone, joining Rick Vaive (three times), Gary Leeman and Dave Andreychuk.
Andreychuk — the most recent to reach the mark — did it three years before Matthews was born.
Matthews has come close twice before and likely would have already scored 50 if the COVID-19 pandemic hadn’t disrupted the past two seasons. In 2019-20 he had 47 goals in 70 games before the season was cancelled early and in 2020-21 he won the Rocket Richard Award with 41 goals in 52 games.
