By Stan Smith

The first period of the Saturday night game between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Carolina Hurricanes was exactly what you might expect to see in a game between a team that has been one the best defensive teams in the league for several years and a team that has recently been winning games by playing sound defensive hockey. It was tight-checking. Neither team gave the other team much room to maneuver. According to Naturalstastrick.com, there were eight High-Danger Scoring chances in the period, five for Toronto and three for Carolina.

That went out the window in the second period. Both teams seemed to abandon any defensive play and decided to exchange turnovers, takeaways, rushes, breakaways, and goals. In the last two periods and overtime, the two teams combined for 33 High-Danger Scoring Chances, 17 for the Hurricanes, and 16 for the Maple Leafs. The game ended with the shot tied at 40-40. I don’t remember the last time I saw a game where both teams had 40 shots. 

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The Good

After neither team found the twine in the first 24 minutes of this game, the Maple Leafs scored three goals in 7:16 of the second period. Breakaway goals by John Tavares and William Nylander were followed by a goal when Tavares botched a breakaway attempt but found a trailing Nick Robertson. Robertson, once again, scored in his first game back after being a healthy scratch for six games.  

Early in the third period, after the Hurricanes closed to within one, David Kampf scored on another breakaway to put the Maple Leafs up 4-2.  

For over half the game, it looked like Ilya Samsonov would be unbeatable. He made three huge saves in the first period to keep the game scoreless and then made a couple of big saves early in the second before the Toronto skaters tilted the ice in their favor. 

The Bad

The Maple Leafs were unable to do something they have been very good at doing in recent games, protect a league by shutting down the opposition. After taking a 3-0 lead, they gave up two goals in the latter half of the first period to let the Hurricane draw to within one.  

Then, after scoring to go ahead 4-2 early in the third period, they allowed Carolina to tie the game up in regulation and ultimately win it in a shootout. 

Special teams ultimately decided this game. Carolina went 2 for 5 on their power play while Toronto went 0 for 4, including a failed 4-on-3 chance in the overtime. 

After being unbeatable in the first 33 minutes of the game, Samsonov gave up four goals on 22 shots over the last 32 minutes of regulation and overtime. None of the goals were what I would consider to be bad goals by Samsonov. They were more a result of bad play by the skaters in front of him. 

The Ugly

We know that last-minute goals are killers. How about last-second goals?  

When it looked like the Maple Leafs might get out of the second period with a successful penalty kill and a two-goal lead, Seth Jarvis banged home a rebound of a Jake Guentzel shot with 2.7 seconds left in the period.

After giving up a six-on-four goal with 1:32 left to go in regulation while Kampf was serving two minutes for hooking and Carolina’s goalie on the bench, it looked like the Maple Leafs might survive a late-game onslaught by the Hurricanes to pull out a victory. But, with 5.8 seconds left in regulation, Sebastion Aho scored his second goal in 1:26 minutes to tie the game and send it into overtime. 

I guess it was only fitting that Guentzel scored the game-winning goal on the very last shot of the night.

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What’s Next?

The Maple Leafs’ next game is a rematch with the Flyers in Philadelphia. This is the second visit to the city of Brotherly Love in less than a week. After Toronto manhandled the Flyers to the tune of 6-2 last Thursday, this might be a good game to dress Ryan Reaves. While this edition of the Flyers is not the Broad Street Bullies of the late 20th Century, I am sure they will be out for revenge, and some blood, on Tuesday. 

Wednesday night the Maple Leafs visit Washington and take on a Capitals team fighting for their postseason lives. The Caps are just one point out of a playoff spot in the East. This game will be Washington’s first home game after a lengthy West Coast road trip that saw them visit five different cities in eight days. I’m guessing both teams might be a little fatigued in that game. 

The Maple Leafs then play their second set of back-to-back games on Saturday and Sunday. They host the always-tough Edmonton Oilers on Saturday and travel to Carolina for a rematch against the Hurricanes on Sunday. 

Hopefully, Toronto will get the services of Mitch Marner back at some point next week. Since Marner played his first game for the Maple Leafs, Toronto is just one game over .500 when he’s been absent. According to the website Statmuse.com, the Maple Leafs have a 15-14-5 record without Marner in the lineup. 

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