Ice Breaker: Matthews drives the Leafs, Zegras feeds Michkov twice
Toronto's power play scored twice to beat Askarov, Zegras assisted on every Flyers goal, and Utah held off a late Pittsburgh push.
Four games, no Panthers, and the Leafs' power play did the talking. Auston Matthews tied it on the man advantage, set up Gavin McKenna's winner on the next one, and Toronto beat a goalie who had no business losing.
Maple Leafs 3, Sharks 1
Mason Marchment had San Jose up in the first, and Yaroslav Askarov made 29 saves to keep it there for most of two periods. Matthews finally beat him on a power play with 12 seconds left in the second.
McKenna won it on another power play early in the third, his third of the season, and Nick Paul hit the empty net. Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 30 of 31.
Sully's chirp: Askarov played well enough to win and lost by two. Welcome to Toronto, kid, where the goalie at the other end always gets the parade.
Utah built a 5-2 lead on goals from Clayton Keller, Kevin Stenlund, Nate Schmidt, Kailer Yamamoto and a Nick Schmaltz power-play strike early in the third. Then Pittsburgh got cute. Egor Chinakhov and Declan Carlile pulled it to one, but Sebastian Cossa's 15 saves on 19 shots were just enough for the win.
Lind's read: Pittsburgh scored four on 19 shots, which is a finishing night, not a trend. Erik Karlsson played 27:40 and had a goal and an assist, so the Penguins are leaning on him harder than a team in their spot probably should.
Flyers 3, Avalanche 2
Matvei Michkov scored twice, once on the power play in the first and again in the second, and Trevor Zegras assisted on all three Philadelphia goals. Noel Acciari's third-period goal held up as the winner. Joseph Woll made 24 saves, and Colorado's late push only got one back.
Sully's chirp: Zegras had three helpers and the Flyers still only scored three. That's not playmaking, that's a man personally carrying the groceries in from the car.
Rangers 5, Ducks 2
Sean Durzi scored 78 seconds in, and New York had five before Anaheim had any. Oliver Bjorkstrand scored twice, J.T. Miller added a power-play goal, and Gabe Perreault chipped in. Dylan Garand made 29 saves, and the Ducks' two goals came in the last 69 seconds.
Lind's read: Anaheim outshot New York 31-30 and lost by three. Garand was the difference, and that's the Rangers' formula at home right now: let the goalie win the shot count you lose.
Three stars of the night
- Auston Matthews, TOR: a goal and two assists, with a hand in both power-play goals that turned the game.
- Trevor Zegras, PHI: three assists, one on every Flyers goal.
- Sergei Bobrovsky, TOR: 30 saves on 31 shots.
Lind's number of the night
4. That's Karlsson's point streak, by our count, after his goal and assist in Utah. He has 11 points in 10 games per NHL data, and Pittsburgh is 1-4 in its last five with a minus-10 goal differential by our count. The blue line is producing. The rest of the sheet isn't keeping up.
By our count, Michkov also pushed his point streak to three games with last night's two goals.
Sully's take of the morning
The Leafs have the best penalty kill in hockey, and now the power play scored twice on Askarov. I wrote they had a losing record anyway yesterday, so naturally they went out and won one out of spite.
Kept off the sheet: Jamie Drysdale, 11 games and zero points at 22.1 minutes a night per NHL data. Buddy, I'm begging you, the puck is allowed past the blue line. It has a visa.
Tonight
Eleven games. ESPN has Boston at Dallas and Tampa Bay at Vegas, the Lightning's road test against an 8-2-0 team. Carolina visits Vancouver with the Canucks at 2-7-1 and winless in their last five by our count. Colorado, Anaheim, San Jose and Toronto all play the second half of a back-to-back, and Toronto's is in Columbus.
The Panthers are off until Wednesday in Ottawa at 7:30 PM ET on Scripps, and Gord has why that one matters for the Senators.
