The Boston Bruins and Toronto Maple Leafs put away most of the hate and big hits and venom from Game 2 and played a solid, nasty game on Monday night.
Game 3 featured tension and animosity but not the thunder from the previous match in Boston.
Auston Matthews broke through for a goal and led the Leafs to a 3-2 win in Game 3 for a 2-1 series lead.
“We just used our speed and we got in their end and tried to play below their dots,” Matthews said. “We did a good job tracking back tonight and supporting our defense and breaking out the puck clean.”
After losing Game 2, Frederik Andersen kept is good play going and made 34 saves to hold off the Bruins for the win.
“He’s just so steady in there. He made some huge saves for us. That one there near the end with the knob of his stick on Krejci all alone in front, he’s just been steady all series and all year for us,” Matthews said. “He’s just been a rock back there, and we trust him every night. It doesn’t matter what the situation is, we feel like we can win because he’s in there.”
David Krejci and Charlie Coyle scored for the Bruins.
“I thought there were some positive things we can get from this game,” Krejci said. “We didn’t give them much offensive chances. I thought we kept them on the outside for the most part for pretty much the whole game, so that was good. Their three goals they got were from when they got to the crease, so those are tough ones.”
Andreas Johnsson and Trevor Moore also scored for the Maple Leafs.
All the scoring ended in the second period as the two teams were left to grind out the final 20 minutes.
“That’s something we struggled with our first year. It’s come quite a long way, and now you just got guys, doesn’t matter who, sacrificing their body and blocking shots and paying the price to obviously win games,” Matthews said. “Like [Mitchell Marner] those last two shots, those two blocks were huge for us. It doesn’t matter who you are, when you see a guy like him sacrifice their body, I think it just motivates everybody on the bench, and obviously with time winding down, that was huge.”
[WATCH: Bruins vs. Maple Leafs Game 3 highlights  | Complete series coverage]
Tuukka Rask made 31 saves in the loss.
“It’s never an ideal situation being down a couple of goals, but we got ourselves back in the game,” Krejci said. “We felt confident enough we could come back in the third. It’s just one goal, but we couldn’t get it today. Playoffs is about getting ready for the next game. It’s a new day tomorrow.”
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