Matt Murray needed some help from all corners to win his first game in close to two seasons.
His offence, the on-ice officials and Toronto’s video coaches all were part of the support group in a 6-3 final over the Buffalo Sabres that was closer than needed to be against a last place team.
In his first game back in 638 days after bilateral hip surgery, Murray made 25 saves on Friday at the KeyBank Center.
With scoring support like he received, it should’ve been well in hand, up four goals against a club winless in its past 11. But goals by Mattias Samuelsson and Owen Power closed them to within two and for a moment it was down to one before a successful challenge that Sam Lafferty had skirted the blue paint and tied up Murray’s stick on a long range goal.
That loosened blue and white collars with a William Nylander empty netter that also made John Tavares the 102nd NHL player to get 600 career assists.
But it was the Leafs’ third line, each collected a goal and part of six forwards who had multi-point nights, who led the way.
Murray had not played since April 2023. Since then, at least three goalies had a run at the No. 1 position that Murray had hoped to become. But it took minor knee surgery to Anthony Stolarz and a needed rest for Joseph Woll to get Murray promoted from the Marlies.
His inspirational months of rehab got him back to AHL action at the end of last year, but wasn’t the end of his story. After signing a minimum wage deal, the near-forgotten man played well enough on the farm this autumn to get a longer look with the Leafs as back-up ahead of Dennis Hildeby after Stolarz was hurt.
The 30-year-old Murray started Friday with an alert arm stop on Beck Malenstyn and through 40 minutes gave up two, the first to JJ Peterka.
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It was Toronto’s season-high third straight performance with at least five goals in a victory, though against a Buffalo side that’s given up five on 11 occasions this season. Toronto retained a piece of first place in the Atlantic Division after the Florida Panthers defeated the St. Louis Blues 2-1 in overtime.
There have been countless tales of the Leafs going into Buffalo with all the friendly crowd support, but laying a huge egg.
But they were good and lucky, going up 2-0 after 20 minutes. Bobby McMann opened the scoring when Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen bet wrong that Max Domi would pass before he fed McMann from a tight angle. Nick Robertson, the third line’s third member took a hard hit to start the play.
The Sabres’ joy at Alex Tuch apparently tying it was short-lived. A linesman had spotted Jason Zucker high-stick Chris Tanev to cause a gusher nose bleed and reported it, with Nylander eluding three Sabres’ sticks to feed Auston Matthews late in the double minor.
Matthews, who caused much murmuring by missing the morning skate with a maintenance issue tied to his slow return to full impact from an upper body injury, scored his 11th. After Matthews took a couple of hard hits on the same shift, including a stiff shoulder by Tage Thompson, defenceman Morgan Rielly went after Thompson, perhaps willing to risk the Leafs could handle Buffalo’s 30th-ranked power play.
Robertson used Domi as a decoy before sinking a five-hole goal, then on the play that gave Mitch Marner another multi-assist game, he sent McMann in with Domi, who took the backhand drop. For Robertson it’s a career-high three-game goal streak.
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Buffalo coach Lindy Ruff, whose earlier tenure in this arena saw years of sustained success against Toronto, pulled Luukkonen for ex-Leaf James Reimer. A botched line change resulted in Max Pacioretty tapping in his fifth of the season.
Woll likely starts Saturday at home against the New York Islanders, who had the benefit of Friday off.
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