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TSN Toronto Maple Leafs Reporter

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TORONTO – The Toronto Maple Leafs may not have earned any style points in Tuesday’s 3-2 victory over the Florida Panthers, but with seven games remaining in the regular season, points in the standings are all that matters.

The Maple Leafs jumped out to a 2-0 lead in a dominant opening 20 minutes against a team that shellacked them 7-2 two weeks ago. But the Panthers were the better team for large portions of the next 40 minutes, which could have cost the Maple Leafs if not for timely saves by goaltender Curtis McElhinney and a shorthanded score from Zach Hyman that ultimately kept Florida at bay.

“I expected the game to be tight at the end; I expect that every night,” head coach Mike Babcock said. “Over time, we’ll learn if you keep going and keep playing the same way, over time you get rewarded for it. We still fluctuate all the time so it’s [more] interesting.”

Toronto retains its one point lead over the Boston Bruins for third place in the Atlantic Division with the victory, their fourth in five games. It was also their first since losing goaltender Frederik Andersen to an upper-body injury in Saturday’s disappointing loss to the Buffalo Sabres. Earlier in the season Toronto has let adversity get the best of them. Even without playing their best hockey on Tuesday, the Maple Leafs found a way to stay ahead.

“[They’re] way bigger games now than the beginning of the season, there’s no space out there and the last couple minutes change everything,” said Leo Komarov. “The mistakes we made in the beginning of the season we try to avoid them now but it’s not like you’re going to do that every day. We gave them some momentum back [in the second half], but otherwise we played really good.”

The Panthers have the best penalty kill in the NHL (85.7 per cent) and it was after killing off two power plays earlier in the second period that the game started to look like it was slipping away from the Maple Leafs. Florida registered only three shots on goal in the first period, but they outshot Toronto by double in the next two frames.

The Panthers also played without starting goaltender James Reimer for the second half of the game after Brian Boyle collided with him midway through the second period; Reto Berra come in to relieve him.

“You want to continue to do the things that are working, but you’re playing against another team that’s going to have some pride,” said Boyle. “We wanted to keep making them defend, especially in the second period, try to keep them from finding their legs, and I think they did a good job countering us.”

Enter McElhinney, who made a number of key saves in the second half of his second start in three games. All the buzz for the last 72 hours has been about Andersen’s health and whether the Maple Leafs could survive without him for any length of time, but McElhinney proved he could step up on the biggest stage he’s ever played on.

“It feels great,” McElhinney said after making 25 saves in the victory. “You’re thrust into a situation with Freddie going down, so for me to go in there, it felt tremendous to get a win for the guys.”

“Mac played great and kept us in it and you get confidence from that,” added Hyman. “When he’s making big saves, you want to play well for him and you have the [2-1] lead going into the third so that’s where you want to be.”

The Maple Leafs’ strength all season has been putting games – good and bad – behind them in a hurry. The young group has an uncanny ability to ignore the noise surrounding them, even as it swells to a crescendo.

“I really believe with our group if we just focus on the day we’re playing and we play right, we have a real good chance to win,” Babcock said. “That’s what we talk about, that’s kind of our mantra – play right, play fast. And we have an opportunity to be successful. We don’t get all caught up in the race.”


Takeaways

He’s number one: Matthews has had a terrific rookie season so far by any standard, and on Tuesday he added his name to the franchise record books for the second time since his four-goal debut. Scoring his 35th goal of the season in the first period, Matthews passed Wendel Clark for most scores by a rookie in franchise history. Clark’s record had stood since 1985-86. The goal also extended Matthews’ point streak to six games, one back of his season-long seven-game streak. Clark joked in the first intermission that he was worried his record would fall in Matthews’ first game before praising Matthews’ goal-scoring acumen that allows him to be such a special player. Matthews also joined elite rookie company in the larger picture, becoming the third first-year player in 22 seasons to score 35 goals. The others – Alex Ovechkin (52) and Sidney Crosby (39).

High on Hyman: While Nylander, Matthews and Mitch Marner have matched or broken more obvious records, Hyman has made his own mark on the Maple Leafs' record book with the most short-handed goals by a first-year. Tuesday’s third-period marker put him at four on the season, and it gave Toronto a huge boost as they struggled to contain the pressing Panthers. With a goal and an assist, it was Hyman’s first multi-point game since Jan. 1. Hyman is the least flashy of the Maple Leafs’ rookie forwards, and he wisely ignores the never-ending commentary about whether he should be playing on Matthews’ wing or not, but what he brings, he brings consistently. He finds a way to have an impact nearly every night, it just often won’t manifest on the scoresheet. In Matthews’ record-breaking campaign Hyman been his constant companion, and the results speak for themselves.

Power trip: The Maple Leafs have had one of the best power plays in the league all season, but in their last two games, it has failed to click when they have needed it most. Against the Sabres on Saturday, Toronto went 0-for-3 with the extra man; on Tuesday they went 0-for-4. That was the worst single-game performance by the power play since going 1-for-5 on Feb. 7 against Dallas. Granted the Panthers have the best kill in the NHL, but Toronto wasn’t even generating solid scoring chances. Babcock called out that group for not being good enough at the start of the second frame, when the Maple Leafs squandered a 5-on-3 chance and gave Florida some life. Toronto has three power play goals on 16 opportunities over their last six games.

Get it right: Minutes after Reilly Smith scored Florida’s first goal of the night to narrow Toronto’s lead to 2-1, Roman Polak, in his first game back from a two-game suspension, was called for high-sticking along the half-boards. But it quickly became clear Jonathan Huberdeau’s own stick hit in him in the face, not Polak’s. The blueliner went to the box for several minutes while Toronto’s alternate captains pleaded their case to referees Kevin Pollack and Brian Pochmara until finally Polak was released as the high-sticking call was overturned. By the letter of the law, referees cannot overturn a penalty based on video replay, but after the play was shown on the scoreboard at Air Canada Centre, it was impossible to ignore that the wrong call had been made. Given how the Panthers had dominated the second period, a penalty there, even with 1:06 left in the frame, could have swung momentum even further for Florida.

Next game: Toronto hits the road for its final trip of the regular season, starting Thursday in Nashville.