The Toronto Maple Leafs needed a good game from everyone on Tuesday night.
The Leafs’ Erik Kallgren made 35 saves in a 4-0 shutout over the Dallas Stars to fulfill that need.
“It feels good,” Kallgren said . “A lot of emotions but I’m really happy for the win.
“I just try to have fun and enjoy this moment. It’s obviously my first NHL start so I just try to have fun. It sounds clichéd but that’s how I tried to embrace this game.”
It was Kallgren ‘s first career NHL start.
The Maple Leafs improved to 32-23-3 after a disturbing loss to the Buffalo Sabres in the Heritage Classic on Sunday.
“It’s a hard game to play when you are pulling the puck out of your net all the time,” Maple Leafs coach Sheldon Keefe said.
“It becomes a real challenge because as players on the ice, you’re questioning yourself and you make mistakes on the ice or you’re a little more nervous.”
The Maple Leafs took a 1-0 lead off a first strike from Rasmus Sandin.
“Erik looked really calm back there,” Sandin said. “I’m super happy for him.
“I think we played a little bit harder. We really focused on our defensive game, took the defensive side of the puck first and then played off that. A lot of things in this game we got done that we need to keep doing every game, some things we still need to clean up, but overall we got the shutout and we needed that.”
John Tavares doubled it to 2-0 with a hit in the same frame.
The Stars dropped to 32-23-3.
“It’s frustrating because we looked slow tonight because we kept turning the puck over,” Dallas coach Rick Bowness said. “Our puck management was terrible all over the ice and they looked a lot faster because their puck management was right on, their passes were right on the tape in full stride. We were putting pucks in skates, bouncing pucks over sticks. … We weren’t nearly physical enough, so if you correct those two areas, the rest of it will correct itself.”
Toronto put the game away with 52 seconds gone in the third period when Ondrej Kase put the Leafs up, 3-0.
“I thought we played really patiently to start the game first of all,” Keefe said. “It took us a while to get our first shot, we stayed with it and we told our group coming in this game was going to require a level of patience both in terms of how we defended but also offensively. Dallas doesn’t give you much, you have to work for your chances. … Shift over shift, line over line, guys just played with a lot of intelligence and composure.”
Ilya Mikheyev hit an empty-net goal for the 4-0 final.
Jake Oettinger made 36 saves in the Stars loss.
“We wanted to put a lot of pucks on him, get a lot of shots, try and make his night difficult,” Dallas’ Jamie Benn said. “I don’t know if we did that. We did have a lot of shots, but we have got to find a way to put a few of those in.”
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