The Maple Leafs almost dropped the ball against the Islanders before the real New Year’s Eve orb could fall in Times Square Tuesday night.
However “a win’s a win … in a pretty non-event game,” said coach Craig Berube, even if his team had to lean extra on goalie Joseph Woll and require even-strength goals from two players who totalled four so far this season.
More of our takeaways on the 3-1 win over New York at Scotiabank Arena:
ANOTHER BRICK
Woll looked like he’d hurt himself in the second period in a fast up-and-down butterfly save sequence, but thankfully for him didn’t join Anthony Stolarz on the injured list in winning consecutive games for the first time since Nov. 30 – Dec. 4. Woll said the discomfort was worse than it looked with the high-traffic Islanders on his turf much of the afternoon.
“I felt I was technically good,” Woll said of his 11th win this season. “(Goalie coach) Curtis Sanford and I have talked about a couple of things and I did a good job implementing those.”
Among his 30 saves, a late-game short-handed breakaway by Brock Nelson, staying with New York’s third-highest scorer as defender Morgan Rielly pursued.
“Mo did a good job disrupting him a bit and allowed me to do my job,” Woll praised.
The crease assignments get interesting now, with Woll carrying the load for at least a couple of more weeks while Stolarz’s minor knee surgery heals. Dennis Hildeby is up from the Marlies, but with Tuesday’s result, Berube has a choice of going back to Woll on the Island Thursday or using the kid and saving Woll for a divisional game here Saturday versus Boston.
GLASS ACT
Lorentz has become well known for testing the glass with some bouncy shoulder checks in warm-ups, even though he managed to get his helmet strap wedged between the panes the other night and Max Domi had to rescue it.
On Tuesday he realized a childhood dream of a dramatic, game-winning goal — beating a defenceman 1-on-1 and going bar down with a laser wrist — with a celebratory Lambeau Leap into the corner window.
“I blacked out afterwards,” laughed Lorentz. “It’s one I’ll remember.
“That wasn’t the celly on my mind, but the boards were there and I thought I’d just test ‘em out one more time.
“I just like getting accustomed to the glass in every rink because it’s different. Some people think it’s a gimmick, but it gets me in a zone.”
More important was being part of much-needed secondary scoring. Auston Matthews is still out until at least Thursday, Matthew Knies’s slump reached eight games and even William Nylander is down to one in his past five. Connor Dewar, who also rang the post, assisted on his goal with Ryan Reaves, the second assist for both fourth liners.
“Huge for our confidence,” Lorentz said. “It’s little things that we do that kind of go unnoticed on the scoresheet. We think we’ve done a pretty good job of that, but it’s no secret we haven’t put up a ton of points.
“As long as we’re winning, it doesn’t matter who scores. It will come and go from different guys across the lineup. The key thing is once playoffs come, everybody contributes in his own way. It might be your 13th forward, kind of like what happened to me last year (in helping Florida win the Stanley Cup).”
UPON FURTHER REVIEW
Deflating as they were for each club, at least the two goals wiped out Tuesday by the coach’s challenges were quick reviews by the on-ice officials and NHL war room.
Adam Pelech’s was called back on a clear offside, while Berube thought the Leafs might have a case to absolve Nylander of goalie interference on Knies’s disallowed marker.
“I thought maybe it could go both ways, but it’s interference,” Berube concluded. “Nylander gets pushed in a little bit, but he could have stopped. I thought it would get called back.
“The offside, we had that (via video coaches Jordan Bean and Sam Kim) before they even scored.”
PATCH IS BACK
From the outset of the game where he drilled Kyle Palmieri into the boards in what was judged a clean hit, to the tripping call and scrum he caused to spoil New York’s 6-on-5 chances, Max Pacioretty continues to justify his place in the lineup as part of Berube’s ‘heavy’ game plan.
”That’s important for those lines, you’ve got Pacioretty, Knies, Bobby McMann,” Berube said. “Big, physical guys who can forecheck, get to the net, create loose pucks and battle. That’s what Patch does.”
EXTRA, EXTRA
Nylander’s two assists moved him past Teeder Kennedy into sole possession of 10th place in franchise history with 331 … Nylander’s second helper after a great pass to Kampf on the first, helped John Tavares to an eight-game points streak which NHL Stats lists as the fifth longest by a Leaf over age 34. Mitch Marner had a nine-gamer going.
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