The Good, Bad & Ugly in Maple Leafs 7-3 Win Over the Habs

The Toronto Maple Leafs visited the Montreal Canadiens Bell Center on Saturday night and came away with a wild 7-3 victory. What were this game’s good, bad, and ugly aspects?

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The Bad: The Canadiens Dominated the First Period

The Canadiens completely dominated the first period. The 13-8 shot count in the Habs’ favor was generous to the Maple Leafs. The period was much more lopsided than that. According to Naturalstattrick.com, Montreal had 73% of the Expected Goals in the period in all situations. They also had seven High Danger Scoring Chances to two for Toronto. The Maple Leafs didn’t help their cause when they took three penalties in the first 18½ minutes. The first call was a borderline hooking call on Philippe Myers. Still, Myers never got to serve it as Kirby Dach scored on a one-timer from the inside of the faceoff circle to the right of Joseph Woll, with Sam Montembeault on the bench for an extra attacker on the delayed call.

After they killed a hooking call on Bobby McMann, Auston Matthews took a four-minute penalty for high-sticking Nick Suzuki at 14:44 of the period. Things got ugly when it looked like the Maple Leafs might survive the double minor and maybe get out of the period down just 1-0 despite being badly outplayed.

The Ugly: Josh Anderson‘s Goal

The Maple Leafs were flawless in killing the first 3:46 of Matthews’ double minor, not allowing a single shot on goal, while the Canadiens had the man advantage. That went for naught when a Patrick Laine one-timer from the faceoff dot to the right of Woll, which Woll was in position to stop, deflected off Conor Timmins’ hip and changed direction on Woll. That made it 2-0 Montreal with 1:39 remaining in the period.

Then, off the faceoff at center ice following the goal, Josh Anderson took a pass from Joel Armia just inside the Toronto blue line, walked past Max Domi’s futile attempt at a poke check, skated in, and beat Woll with a backhander over the blocker to make the score 3-0 Habs. In nine seconds, the Canadiens went from being up 1-0 to being ahead 3-0.

The Good: Woll Shuts the Door, Maple Leafs Begin to Score

That was it for the Canadiens’ scoring, though. Woll shut the door from that point on, and the Maple Leafs scored seven unanswered goals to win the game 7-3. I could say the Maple Leafs were the dominant team in the last two periods, but I would be lying.

Despite giving up three goals on twelve shots in the first period, Woll was still the best player on either team throughout the game. If not for Woll, the score of this game could have easily been something like 12-7 Canadiens. According to Naturalstattrick, Montreal had 17 High Danger Scoring Chances to Toronto’s 13 in all situations in the game. By the eye test, most of those chances were pure open-net scoring chances. Even when Woll gave up the trio of goals in the first period, he made five or six fantastic saves.

While Matthews and William Nylander scored goals and Mitch Marner added two assists, Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Bobby McMann led the offense. Ekman-Larsson set up the goal that pulled the Maple Leafs to within a goal of the Canadiens with 1:14 left in the second period. It was his point shot that Nick Robertson tipped past Montembeault. OEL scored the winning goal on a point shot with the man advantage 4:31 into the third period. He added another assist on Steven Lorentz’s goal later in the third. If my research is correct, it is the first three-point game Ekman-Larsson has had since January 2021, when he was with the Arizona Coyotes.

Bobby McMann Makes a Difference for the Maple Leafs

Bobby McMann opened the scoring on what might be one of the slowest 2-on-1 rushes you will ever see. McMann and Nylander were at the tail end of a long shift when Christian Dvorak rang a shot off the crossbar that rebounded to McMann at center ice as he appeared to be headed to the bench along with Nylander. McMann corralled the puck. He then huffed and puffed his way down the ice with Nylander. Instead of passing, McMann took the shot and beat Montembeault over the shoulder stick side.

Just 24 seconds into the third period, McMann knocked the puck off Anderson’s stick inside the Toronto blue line out to center ice, where Nylander picked it up and broke down the ice, fighting off Lane Hutson the whole way and beating Montembeault with a backhand deke to tie the game at 3-3.

Craig Berube demonstrated his stance on accountability in this game. In the first period, Myers and Morgan Rielly were on the ice for two of the Canadiens’ three goals. Myers only saw the ice four times in the last two periods for just over three minutes. Morgan Rielly only played 16:27 of ice time in the game. It’s by far the lowest TOI for Rielly this season and five minutes less than his average ice time. Jake McCabe (26:06), Chris Tanev (24:16), and OEL (22:35) led the way in ice time for Toronto’s defense.

After Anderson walked Domi on the third Montreal goal, he was replaced by Pontus Holmberg on the second line. Also, with the pace of this game being extremely fast, Berube double-shifted Marner, playing him both on the first and fourth line. Ryan Reaves was limited to just 6:38 of ice time.

What’s Next for the Maple Leafs?

The Maple Leafs host the Tampa Bay Lightning on Amazon Prime’s Monday Night Hockey, then host the Columbus Blue Jackets on Wednesday night before heading to Ottawa next Saturday night to take on the Senators.

Related: Replacing John Tavares’ Offense: A Challenge for the Maple Leafs