CALGARY — Great tension begets great relief.
“We needed this,” Sheldon Keefe said, speaking for himself and everyone else on the Toronto Maple Leafs.
The situation must have felt all too familiar: a multi-goal lead at grave risk of vanishing in the third period.
Except this time — thanks to an Auston Matthews–triggered comeback of their own and a very keen coach’s challenge — the Maple Leafs flipped the script and locked it down, snuffing their four-game skid and escaping Calgary with a nail-biting 4-3 victory.
“That was a big win for us,” goaltender Martin Jones said.
Out the gates, it looked like big trouble.
The Flames, entering this one-anthem game on their hottest streak all season, built an early and well-deserved 2-0 lead, dominating the high-danger chances of the first period 6-0.
But while the Flames owned the puck, they do not possess a game-breaker of Matthews’ ilk.
In a late-first-period flash, the superstar gathered a sloppy Noah Gregor pass from behind his back, slipped it between his legs and snapped the thing clean past poor Dan Vladar to stop the bleeding.
A fantastic second period for Toronto brought three more Toronto goals, Matthews assisting on one and scoring two more.
Despite being 3,394 kilometres away from home, hats rained in buckets to celebrate the Rocket Richard Trophy leader’s three-goal night and rousing chants of “M-V-P!” bellowed from the Saddledome’s invasion of Leafs Nation.
Had Matthews not gone full beast mode Thursday — registering his fourth hat trick, 12th multi-goal night, and leaping to a 71-goal pace — this column would be about Toronto’s longest losing skid since 2021 and a scrappy Flames group that still believes it can make the dance.
“While he scored big goals tonight, he also defended extremely hard,” Keefe noted. “Once we get the lead, now we need him to defend, need him to compete and lead the way that way.”
Jones, an 11-year vet, says he’s never played with anyone who can break open a game like Matthews.
“It’s fun to watch. I mean, it’s pretty impressive. It always feels like even when we’re down two in the first that we’re never really out of the game because we got some weapons that can dig us out of those holes,” Jones said.
Added T.J. Brodie: “Honestly, I feel like you sorta just get used to it. The way he just scores, it’s incredible.”
Matthews’ tour de force gained a lead, but retaining one has been another matter.
Andrew Mangiapane chopped the game to 4-3, and Connor Zary appeared to tie the back-and-forth thriller with a dogged effort in the dreaded third period.
Not so fast.
Leafs video coaches Jordan Bean and Sam Kim detected a Blake Coleman hand pass earlier in the scoring sequence and informed Keefe on the bench. Bean wasn’t 100 per cent certain, though, and wanted to replay the scene from more angles.
Keefe bought his staff time by calling a timeout before throwing the flag.
Bean and Kim were correct, because they’re always correct, and the home team’s goal was wiped off the board — saving the lead and buying the Leafs a breath.
“A big turning point in the game,” Matthews said.
“They’ve been on fire back there,” echoed Calgary-born William Nylander. “I don’t know how quick they were to catch that. But, I mean, I didn’t even notice that play happening during the game. So, that was unreal by them to catch that.”
And more love, from Brodie: “They don’t have much time to go through that stuff. And some of it’s so tight. I don’t even know if they’ve missed one yet.”
Saved by his eagle-eye video coaches, a much chattier post-game version of Keefe jumped to heap praise on the duo post-game.
“They’re so dialed in,” Keefe said. “You get to see it on display with the challenges, but those guys are MVPs of our staff every day.”
Yet even with Zary’s goal erased by a ticky-tack but correct slow-motion examination, the Leafs still needed to salt the win away.
And, for the first time in five tries, they did. Toronto out-chanced the Flames in the third, played in the offensive zone, and put the much-needed win to bed by drawing a late penalty.
“Guys didn’t panic. Guys weren’t tight; they were loose. Loose in terms of how they played because they just played hockey,” said Keefe, who had been less than loose during Thursday’s abnormally intense 20-minute morning skate.
Again, all the anxiety around this club of late makes the two points taste so much sweeter.
“It’s supposed to be hard. You’re supposed to find a way through it,” Keefe said. “And as much as I would have liked to have some more goals and some breathing room, we needed this here tonight.”
Fox’s Fast Five
• Yegor Sharangovich: 19 goals, 32 points, 25 years old.
Tyler Toffoli: 16 goals, 29 points, 31 years old.
When you add the third-rounder, Flames rookie GM Craig Conroy is on track to have won his first trade.
• Top prospect Fraser Minten and the whole Saskatoon Blades were in the barn for this one. Minten doesn’t miss a Leafs game.
• John Tavares‘s point drought has reached six games.
It’s been nearly 15 years since the captain has been kept off the scoresheet this long; his last six-game drought was in 2011 on Long Island.
Moreover, Tavares has been a minus-2 in each of his past four games. That’s a career first.
Tavares maintains that he’s skating well and is not trying to manufacture scoring chances out of nothing as he looks to bust the slump.
“I have confidence in him that he’s going to find his stride again and catch fire,” linemate Matthew Knies says. “He’s too good of a player for it to not come.”
• Ex-Leaf Nazem Kadri told Real Kyper & Bourne this week that, yes, indeed, opponents care more about beating Toronto more than other clubs.
“You know what? That’s absolutely factual,” Kadri said. “I did not realize that until I moved out of the Toronto bubble.”
Kadri still circles these tilts on his calendar.
• How vocal are Maple Leafs fans during their annual trip to the Saddledome?
Enough that we’re pretty sure the visitors’ fan base guilted the refs into a tripping call on the home team in the second period.
