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Outshot 39-19, the Maple Leafs’ third line, penalty kill, and primarily Joseph Woll carried the team to a 5-3 victory in Dallas on Thursday night.

Your game in 10:

1.   Craig Berube sent out the Matthew Knies – John Tavares – Max Pacioretty line to start the game, followed by the Bobby McMann – Max Domi – Nick Robertson third line that was effective/productive against the Sabres, so his loaded-up line didn’t touch the ice until the third shift.

Personally, I liked Berube’s call to start the game with the team’s heaviest line and also to get the third line on the ice right off the hop. The Matthews-Marner line seldom starts a game by flying out of the gates from the first shift. Seeing if the other lines can tilt the ice first so the top line can hop the boards in the wake of some momentum made some sense to me, given that slow starts have been an issue in the last few weeks.

Nothing special happened on the first few shifts in terms of shots, chances, or sustained zone time for the Leafs — mostly 50-50 shifts — although they did at least get two pucks in deep and recover them.

2.   Speaking of the loaded-up top line, it was an inauspicious start for the trio as they conceded a goal to Dallas’ third line five minutes in.

This 1-0 goal was on Auston Matthews. He needed to dig in to get back above Sam Steel in the neutral zone, as Jake McCabe was committed on the wall. Sure, McCabe could’ve recovered quicker (he sort of lost his balance), but Matthews letting up as though he assumed McCabe would get back to break it up and prevent the potential breakaway was either a bad read or laziness.

From there, Matthews made the situation worse. Steel actually didn’t get away clean and clear, as he lost the handle and needed to collect the puck off the wall. Matthews skated straight for the puck as though he was going to poke it loose or pickpocket Steel. He would’ve had a shot at disrupting the cut-in on net if he hustled back toward the middle, stayed goal-side, and tried to get his body in Steel’s way instead.

3.    For the second time in as many games, the Leafs‘ new third line got the Leafs going when the team was in a bit of a bind, scoring less than a minute after the Stars took the 1-0 lead. Max Domi seized on Stars defenseman Brendan Smith overskating a bouncing puck in the neutral zone and buried a really nice finish past Jake Oettinger.

You could see the confidence Domi was now riding after breaking through with a goal and assist vs. Buffalo. When he’s not confident, we’ve seen him kind of dither in those situations, and the chance sort of dies out, or he forces a pass. This time, he quickly scanned the ice and was decisive about calling his own number, picking his spot, and finishing tidily into the far corner of the net.

It’s funny that only when the Leafs load up with $35 million worth of scoring talent on a single line — the total opposite of balancing out the lines — does the third unit start contributing meaningfully.

In all seriousness, it’s because McMann and Domi are now healthy, and this is what Domi has to bring to the table for the team. Over the summer, Brad Treliving decided to spend a little bit on the new contract for his seventh-best forward, which the Leafs have rarely done with secondary forwards under this current cap/roster model. It can’t only be as a possible RW option for Matthews where Domi makes a real difference offensively; he needs to breathe life into a third line with his speed, playmaking, and, yes, his shot, which is better than even Domi appears to think at times. Domi’s best stretches in this position (3C) have come alongside Robertson, but this time, they have a better LWer to help elevate the line.

So far, so good. Outside of a one-off night in Detroit (when he was still on the RW with Minten), Domi’s impact on the line has been encouraging since his return from injury. To some extent, harshly judging his pre-injury performances is a bit unfair, as he was battling through pain for the team at a time when Matthews was out.

4.    The top line continued to struggle with some dangerous turnovers, but the Leafs had the period/game in a decent spot after the 1-1 goal. Max Pacioretty ran over Mavrik Bourque, drawing a retaliatory penalty from the Stars.

On the ensuing power play, William Nylander played the full two minutes, as he has been doing on the PP, and threw the puck away or mishandled it three times, leading to Dallas clears. It earned him a tongue-lashing from Craig Berube, who implored Nylander to wake up on the bench. Shockingly, this was the last power-play opportunity of the entire game for the Leafs.

From there, the Leafs ran into penalty trouble, and Dallas started to really take over the game. Conor Timmins took two penalties — one for a puck-over-glass and one slashing call after Brendan Smith activated and beat Pacioretty up the ice, leading to a point-blank chance and a hectic scramble.

The Leafs’ kill came up big for the team, and David Kampf — who had a nice return game at both five-on-five and the PK — made an immediate positive impact on the units by breaking up a play. At five-on-five, the Leafs were struggling to find their footing again, turning pucks over frequently and failing to break out cleanly.

The shots on goal ended 15-4 in Dallas’ favour after 20 minutes. The Leafs had Joseph Woll and their PK to thank for a 1-1 tie at intermission.

5.   The top line started the second period and conceded their second goal against of the game. This one wasn’t on the forwards, though.

Just 15 seconds in, Jamie Benn sent a puck up the wall that was nicely redirected by Wyatt Johnston as OEL stepped up on Johnston in the neutral zone. It sprung a fairly innocuous-looking 1v1 situation between Evgenii Dadonov and Morgan Rielly, with Marner providing some support on the backcheck, but Rielly allowed a fairly generous gap. When Dadonov showed him the puck within poke-check range, Rielly couldn’t quite time it and get stick-on-puck; Dadonov made a subtle move to pull it away from Rielly and beat Joseph Woll on his short side with a nice shot.

After the 2-1 goal, this game could’ve gotten away from Toronto if not for Woll. Another turnover on the breakout — Domi missed an east-west pass at his own blue line intended to spring Rielly  — led to a dangerous chance against. A breakaway for Roope Hintz followed it, as the top line + OEL got caught with four in deep. Woll continued to be the team’s best player as the Leafs ran up an 18-4 shot deficit.

6.   Against the run of play, it was 3-2 Leafs in a flash, thanks to two goals in 16 seconds.

The top line immediately turned another puck over in the defensive zone after the Hintz breakaway bail-out by Woll, as Marner fell over in the corner, and Matthews’ pass was likely off the mark anyway. A few seconds later, they connected on a three-way passing play for a goal, starting with Marner’s stretch pass from the corner of the defensive zone.

Matthews released the zone after a Dallas point shot, received the pass around center ice, bought some time for Nylander to catch up, and sent Nylander in alone for a no-doubter of a top-shelf finish.

It was a wild sequence, and the tied game felt a bit like stealing at this point from the Leafs’ perspective. It was also an example of the magic that’s always possible with these three together, even if the verdict is very much out on them as a regular five-on-five line beyond the situational deployment (o-zone opportunities, down a goal, etc).

7.   The Leafs immediately pulled ahead, as a broken play off the rush for Toronto’s third line saw old friend Mason Marchment overskate a puck and leave it in the high slot for Nick Robertson to pounce on.

Robertson’s shot never should’ve beaten Jake Oettinger clean through the five-hole, but credit to Robertson for reloading quickly after the initial play broke down and getting a shot off.

The game went through a stretch of open play and traded chances, including a 3v1 for the Leafs where Steven Lorentz was leading it (it didn’t end well). The Leafs’ PK continued to excel after a Benoit penalty, which came right after a bad missed call on a Dallas high stick on Matthew Knies. More PK and Woll goodness set the stage for the third line to make it 4-2 five minutes after the 3-2 goal.

8.   Robertson deserves full marks for the sequence leading up to the 4-2 goal by Bobby McMann. It was the encapsulation of the “forecheck, backcheck, paycheque” motto that Nikita Grebenkin is so fond of; Robertson flew in on the forecheck and landed a really solid hit on Ilya Lyubushkin before furiously backchecking when the puck broke the other way.

Robertson intercepted a pass outside the offensive zone blue line and sent McMann in for a well-placed finished, although Oettinger probably should’ve stopped this one, too (he was later pulled at the second intermission). Four goals on eight shots gave the Maple Leafs a 4-2 lead.

It’s often been pointed out that the key to sparking Robertson’s production is to healthy scratch him for a few games, as the pattern over the years is undeniable. To be fair, he has largely been working his ass off all season, which earned him some rope with Berube as he went through the 1-point-in-19-games drought (Robertson was actually at least even in plus/minus during that stretch despite the lack of production). It was nice to see him rewarded — in front of his parents and against his older brother, to boot.

Connor Dewar was sitting out tonight, and while it’s fair to argue it should be Ryan Reaves making way for Dewar, Robertson is on this bubble, too, and needs to produce to stay in the lineup, knowing Dewar brings more as a checker and on special teams.

9.    It was a better second half to the second period from the top line, which started to generate a few offensive-zone shifts, and Matthews nearly scored with around eight minutes left (the puck trickled along the goal line).

The Leafs have only blown two leads this season — best in the league — and generally play really sound hockey from in front. When the Leafs leaked oil in the first half of this game, it had less to do with their actual defensive play and more to do with puck management; they were putting themselves in bad positions and scrambling to recover, not even giving themselves a chance to defend inside their structure. As they simplify and play a patient game inside their structure, with great goaltending and a strong PK to lean on, they are a tough nut to crack with the lead.

That said, this wasn’t their cleanest close-out effort of the season. With 11 minutes left, they gave up a 2v1 that required a 10-bell save on Miro Heiskanen from Joseph Woll — his best stop of the night, which was really saying something. Not for the first time in the game, Pacioretty was beaten up on the ice by an activating Stars defenseman on the play.

Pacioretty also turned a few pucks over on the right wall when breaking out in this game — something to monitor if he remains a part of a Knies-Tavares line as he adjusts to the off-wing.

The Leafs also went to another PK after a dubious Tavares elbowing call. The PK continued to hold steady; Chris Tanev was again excellent on this kill, blocking a shot and calmly starting a breakout for a clearance, and Steven Lorentz created a shorthanded breakaway. Lorentz went for a half-clapper, but the pursuing defenseman got just enough of his stick to prevent him from elevating it as he wanted.

The Leafs were also pretty scrambly in their own zone late with the goalie pulled and conceded a 4-3 goal. Matthews was tired after a long shift and an icing, and when he fell down and sprawled to clear the puck unsuccessfully, Knies was overeager to leave the zone for an empty-net opportunity. Heiskanen stepped in off the point with the puck, and the Stars had a heavily-outnumbered situation in their favour at the net front as Colin Blackwell made it 4-3.

From there, John Tavares made a hell of a play on the wall in the defensive zone to clear the puck and set up the empty-net clincher for Nylander.

It wasn’t the most convincing performance at five-on-five, but the Leafs scored four five-on-five goals, and for the second straight game — this time against a much better opponent, albeit one missing key pieces on the blue line — they flipped a game very quickly with a big offensive breakthrough. We all knew the group had it in them, but it’s good to see it play out on the ice — and in neither game did their top line drive much of it.

10.    Based on this game, there is enough evidence, if you wanted to find it, to declare the experiment over regarding the loaded-up line and Pacioretty on the right wing with Tavares and Knies. The Tavares line didn’t register a shot on goal in 8:30 of five-on-five time, and shot attempts were 6-2 Dallas in those minutes. The big line was outscored 2-1 and outshot 8-6 at five-on-five. On top of Woll and the PK, it was the third line that won the game for the team.

However, if you actually believe in the long-term viability and potential rewards of this top six arrangement (I don’t, personally), an adjustment period is to be expected.

Maybe Berube wants to give it some more run, and, notably, the Leafs are playing Buffalo on Friday; this was the opponent Berube made the switch against on Sunday, citing that he wanted to get Matthews and Marner away from the Tage Thompson matchup to see if he could spark some offense alongside Nylander while forming a “heavy” line centered by Tavares for the top matchup. Berube won’t own the last change on the road this time, though, and his review of the top line’s play tonight was critical and accurate. I’ll be curious to see if he pulls the chute on it or explores these lines further.

Game Flow: 5v5 Shot Attempts

Heat Map: 5v5 Shot Attempts

Game Highlights w/ Joe Bowen & Jim Ralph

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