Toronto Maple Leafs forward Matthew Knies scores against Philadelphia Flyers goaltender Ivan Fedotov as defenseman Egor Zamula looks on during the first period at Scotiabank Arena.John E. Sokolowski/Reuters
The Toronto Maple Leafs hit the halfway point of their season with Sunday’s 3-2 overtime win against the Philadelphia Flyers.
While there is much to be positive about 41 games into the season, with the team top of the Atlantic Division, four points clear of the defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers, things are only going to get tougher.
That was essentially the message from head coach Craig Berube following the game, which saw Morgan Rielly register his fifth goal of the season 2:25 into sudden death to put the finishing touch on the team’s 26th victory of the campaign. Asked whether there are any similarities between this Leafs team and his 2019 St. Louis Blues squad – which famously went on to win the franchise’s first championship that spring – Berube was only too happy to compare the two.
“I mean, yeah, to a certain extent,” he said. “I think that team played with an identity every night, and I find our team is really starting to trend now, playing with that identity every night, staying patient, not forcing things too much. You’re going to have a lot of difficult games where, it’s not easy hockey, it’s hard hockey. It’s only going to get more difficult now down the stretch, in my opinion.”
Toronto’s winning streak hit four games after a tough stretch of games, which included three games in four nights, culminating in back-to-back games over the weekend against the Boston Bruins and then the Flyers.
But the team benefited from some virtuoso performances, most notably from both Mitch Marner and Matthew Knies on Saturday night, as both contributed five points – including Knies’s first career hat trick – as the Leafs overcame their nemesis from Boston.
On Sunday, with the offence mostly held in check, the Leafs were forced to rely on rookie goaltender Dennis Hildeby, who stopped 30 of the 32 shots he faced to win his third game of the season. The 23-year-old, making just his fourth NHL start, allowed a goal just 3:24 in when Alliston, Ont., native Tyson Foerster rifled a wrist shot past him from the top of the faceoff circle. But the Swedish netminder stood tall from that point on, making a bunch of difficult stops to keep his team in the game.
“Think I had a rough start there with the first goal,” Hildeby said afterwards. “Could have done better, but progressed and the game got better the longer it went for sure.”
Knies ensured the Leafs weren’t behind for long, tapping in his fourth goal in two games – and sixth point – just 38 seconds after the Flyers scored to tie his single-season career high of 15 goals. And while Oliver Ekman-Larsson put the Leafs in front just before the end of the first period, Scott Laughton tied the game just after the midway point of the second, ultimately pushing the game to overtime.
However, on a night when the Leafs’ offence was mostly subpar – the blueline accounted for two of the three goals – the team’s overall defensive play tightened up, much to Berube’s pleasure.
“Third period [we] came out and gave up one scoring chance five on five, so that’s just really good hockey by us,” he said. “Gutsy. I thought it was a gutsy win. Philly’s hard to play against. They’re quick, they’re fast. They played hard and they had legs. So it was a difficult game for us.”
In the end, Auston Matthews – playing just his second game after sitting out the previous six with an undisclosed upper-body injury – set up the winning goal in overtime, sliding a perfect pass over to Rielly for his second assist of the game.
Rielly didn’t hesitate, picking his spot and firing the puck past Ivan Fedotov to notch the sixth overtime winner of his career, “moving within one of tying Tomas Kaberle for the most by a defenceman in Maple Leafs history,” per NHL Stats.
But while the longest-tenured Maple Leaf on the roster was happy to help his team pick up the two points, he was equally happy to see the progress the team has made this season under its new head coach.
“I think we’re happy with where we’re at,” he said. “There’s always going to be room for improvements, and there’s always going to be changes that we want to make. … I think if you look at the close games that we’ve been in lately, the fact we’ve been able to pull them out feels good. So it’s a work in progress as always, but I think there’s some good things going on.”
The only knock on the night was the injury suffered by Jake McCabe, who hit his head on the ice during a fight with Philadelphia’s Garnet Hathaway with six seconds remaining in the first period. The defenceman did not return to the game, and while Berube couldn’t comment on the extent of the injury, he said he “didn’t like what I saw.” McCabe missed five games last month after taking a puck to the helmet in a game against Tampa Bay at the end of November.
The Maple Leafs now head to Philadelphia for a rematch with the Flyers on Tuesday night.