Coming off a lacklustre loss in Nashville, the Maple Leafs responded with a strong team effort against a miserable Philadelphia Flyers team, including a 1-for-1 night on the power play and six five-on-five goals from three separate lines (three from the McMann-Tavares-Nylander trio).
Your game in 10:
1. In a first period Leafs generally controlled — shots were 10-3, and an early 4-on-4 led to a couple of great looks without getting a shot off — Toronto fell behind first (and still won), as was the pattern in these Leafs vs. Flyers games this season.
Retrieving a dump-in by the Flyers eight minutes into the game, John Tavares seemed to be of a few minds, likely first wondering if it’d be icing, if he should chip it back to OEL on his forehand, or turn it up the wall on his backhand. Regrettably, he turned it up the wall on his backhand and got stuffed.
While Nylander fished for a breakaway, Matthew Knies seemed caught between whether he was changing later in his shift — he signaled to the bench initially — or going back to support the puck. A Tavares turnover and a well-executed one-timer goal for Ryan Poehling, who had plenty of space in the high slot, opened the scoring for the Flyers.
2. The Leafs had been here before against the Flyers and didn’t look too rattled by the early deficit. They fairly quickly got back to their game and tied it up just 2.5 minutes later.
First, their fourth line generated a positive shift, as David Kampf burst through the neutral zone and drove wide for an effort on goal before Morgan Rielly threw a shot on net with traffic. It set the table for the second line to come over the boards for an offensive-zone draw.
Tavares was initially tossed from the draw, leading to a lost winger faceoff by Nylander, but McMann did a bang-up job of closing down and forcing a turnover behind the net, which Nylander and Tavares then took full advantage of.
Tavares has had much prettier finishes in this recent stretch where he’s been blasting pucks by goaltenders — this one deflected in off of Cam York — but one way or another, it seems automatic when #91 gets the puck inside a little bit of space in the slot right now.
3. A too-many-men penalty by the Flyers 14 minutes into the game led to a Leafs power play that started off a little bit disjointed. However, just past the minute mark of the PP, they broke the Flyers’ PK down.
The Flyers were applying plenty of puck pressure, but the Leafs‘ top unit did a tidy job of withstanding the heat and retaining puck possession, quickly working it across the zone and back into the inside of the PK unit. When Tavares found Matthews in the middle, Knies took a Matthews shot to the midsection but stuck with it with a nice between-the-legs pass out to Nylander at the side of the net.
Instead of rushing a shot as Samuel Ersson scrambled across, Nylander made a nice play by taking a beat and firing it toward the back post area, benefitting from a friendly deflection off a Flyers defenseman. It was a good bounce but also a strong percentage play by Nylander, given there was so much traffic in the crease and the goalie was drawn out of position.
With the goal, the Leafs’ power play remains over 40% in March. We’ve seen gangbusters months of production give way to barren spells at the most important time of year — and no one will remember this month if it dries up again when it matters — but all they can do in the meantime is try to roll into the playoffs with serious momentum and confidence. They’re doing exactly that right now with this five-forward unit.
4. The Leafs dodged a bullet early in the second period on a bit of a Keystone Cops routine where McCabe fumbled a puck and then was wiped out by a falling Matthews immediately afterward, leading to a 2v1 one-time look that Sean Couturier badly fanned on with an empty net at his mercy. Any chance this game would remain competitive probably swung here as the Leafs almost immediately scored the other way.
McMann’s physicality on the forecheck — against an AHL-calibre defenseman who had a travesty of a game, Emil Andrae — led to another Flyer turnover up the wall (and a lost stick for Andrae). Nylander rounded the net with the puck and picked out McMann in front for his 20th of the season.
McMann hit his first career 20-goal milestone in just 63 games and did it despite two separate 12 and 13-game goalless droughts this season (and a healthy scratch on opening night). He’s been streaky, but he’s heating up at the right time and, most importantly — unlike last spring — he’s currently healthy and in form. His absence from the Bruins series probably doesn’t receive enough mention amid the Nylander, Matthews, and Woll injury situations that notably affected the series result.
5. Five minutes later, the Tavares line continued to pour it on, although this sequence started with Matthew Knies‘ efforts.
It came at the end of a shift where the top line was scrambling in its own zone and nearly conceded a goal (Philly hit the post). Late in his shift, instead of changing off, Knies dug deep to retrieve his own dump in and rimmed it around to Marner, who found Tavares open in the slot coming off the bench. When we type the words “Tavares” and “open the slot,” you know the rest at this point. Tavares is up to 32 goals now, 11 of which have come in the 16 games since the 4 Nations break.
The Leafs generated a lot off their forecheck in this game. The only way they were losing to this Flyers team is if they allowed themselves to be outworked tonight — which would’ve been highly concerning coming off of the Predators loss — but they didn’t let it happen, and their talent easily won out from there.
6. The game was officially a laugher four minutes later. Off an offensive-zone draw stemming from an icing forced by the Tavares line’s forecheck, McMann made another good puck recovery off a scrummed faceoff.
Tavares threw a blind backhand pass into the slot, sensing teammates were in the area, and the puck made its way back to Nylander at the top of the circles, where he made no mistake through a struggling Ersson.
That’s #40 for Nylander for the third straight season, and the McMann-Tavares-Nylander line’s eighth five-on-five goal vs. two against this season (along with a 68% xGF).
7. If this game wasn’t already a laugher, a short while later, David Kampf made it 6-1 on a free-and-clear breakaway from the Leafs’ blue line in. Calle Jarnkrok and Steven Lorentz combined to turn a puck over inside the line as a Flyers change was underway, and Kampf finished nicely through the five-hole.
Given Holmberg has played over Kampf at times recently — and was practicing in his place at 4C on Tuesday — it’s fair to point out that it’s difficult to see Holmberg beating the goalie 1v1 in such a scenario, even against Samuel Ersson. It’s also fair to point out that Kampf has scored more goals this season against an actual goalie despite playing exclusively 4C minutes (three of Holmberg’s six goals are empty-netters compared to one from Kampf), while Holmberg has spent time up and down the lineup, including reasonable stretches of time on scoring lines.
Holmberg can still be useful as a depth wing piece, but combine the PK utility, faceoff ability, and Kampf’s superior finishing (stated on a relative basis), there isn’t much to go on in terms of Holmberg plugging in at 4C over the player they paid $2.5 million with term to fill the role capably.
8. The Leafs gave one back late in the second on a dump-in retrieval, low-to-high, slot-tip play by the Flyers, finished by Sean Couturier.
As much as he deserves some credit for stepping up his game recently, a persistent issue in Max Domi‘s game is his tendency to shut off defensively, gravitate toward the puck out of position, or just stand around and puck-watch. As a center in the middle of the zone here, there has to be a more active scanning of the ice for developing danger/identifying where his man is. OEL saw Couturier cutting across freely and tried to take a few strides out towards him, but he couldn’t get out on him to grab his stick.
The concern at this point was that Scott Laughton, who was physical throughout (five recorded hits) and nearly connected with Domi on a few plays for potential scoring chances, might leave a blowout win over his former team with a minus next to his name. That would’ve been a shame, especially given the nature of his start to his Toronto tenure.
9. Thankfully, halfway through the third period, Domi’s goal reversed the third line’s second-period minus. After a good defensive stick defending the rush by Jake McCabe created a loose puck race, Domi torched Andrae and found a hole in Ersson to make it 7-2 (Domi’s seventh of the season).
The Leafs scored six five-on-five goals in this game, and technically, none came from the top line, albeit Knies and Marner set up one Tavares goal. Marner also had a third-period goal called back for goalie interference on a tough play five minutes into the third; he tried a between-the-legs finish at the top of the crease, and his momentum carried him forward as Ersson came across, which led to an accidental collision before Rielly shot it into the empty net.
10. To see this game out, all that was required was a reasonably professional final period, and the Leafs managed that while not taking a penalty with the lead in the final 40 minutes of the game.
In addition to the two points and the generally strong response to the dud in Nashville, the good news — ahead of yet another three-in-four set coming up from Thursday-Sunday on the road — is that this was a blowout early enough in the game that Berube was able to keep Marner, Matthews, Nylander, and Tavares all in the 15-16.5 min range. On defense, Simon Benoit led the unit with 21:13 in time on ice, as McCabe and Tanev finished at 18 minutes and change.
All in all, it was mission accomplished for the Maple Leafs.
Game Flow: 5v5 Shot Attempts
Heat Map: 5v5 Shot Attempts
