In Toronto, the visiting Vegas Golden Knights put a hurt on the Maple Leafs Tuesday night with a 6-2 win.
Vegas kept all the big hitters off the scoresheet for the win.
“It’s a pretty good framework of how we want to play all the time, but given we are missing some of the dynamic players in our lineup, we just had to check better than we have lately,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said. “Certainly against Toronto the last time we didn’t do a good enough job (in a 7-3 loss on Feb. 22). I thought we really focused on that part of the game and got above their guys in the middle of the ice, [showed] discipline for the most part and checked with our feet.”
Adin Hill made 29 saves in the win.
Vegas moved to 33-19-7, snapping a three-game skid.
“Pretty good game for us to be honest, especially when you are struggling to get some wins in the last five or six,” Vegas’ Ivan Barbashev said. “So, this feels really good and I think it’s really good for our group, especially when you win a game against Toronto.”
After a scoreless opening stanza, Barbashev broke the ice midway through the middle frame frame for a 1-0 lead to Vegas, scoring off a breakaway.
“It was just a simple face-off play, we lost it, and somehow I got behind them,” Barbashev said. “I don’t know, it seemed like I had quite a lot of time out there.”
Morgan Rielly sprang Barbashev on the break.
I don’t think we expected him to keep going,” Rielly said. “Most times on our offensive-zone face-offs, when we win it, the other team goes into a defensive-zone structure, they don’t leave. But it’s on us. It’s on me to be aware of that and adjust when that happens.”
Vegas’ Mason Morelli pushed the advantage to 2-0 at 12:20 scoring from the slot.
“It was very cool, obviously, especially scoring here in Toronto. It was pretty cool,” Morelli said. “Credit to Theodore. It was a really good shot by him. I just thought we played real hard tonight and everyone contributed to the win.”
The Maple Leafs got on the board when Tyler broke through to trim the deficit to 2-1, at 17:45.
William Karlsson got the Vegas lead back to two, when he scored with 51 seconds left in the middle frame.
“I thought they did a good job, obviously, and we just kind of got away from our game I think,” Rielly said. “They were opportunistic and they took advantage of their chances.”
The Maple Leafs dropped 33-17-8, ending a seven-game streak
“I loved our start. In fact, I thought it was our best start of the season the first seven, eight minutes,” Toronto coach Sheldon Keefe said. “… Guys were flying, puck was moving well, our pace was outstanding, we had great scoring chances but didn’t score, line changes, shift length, like everything you wanted at the start of the game I thought we were tremendous there. Puck didn’t fall for us, and then because it was going so well, I thought we started to overdo it. I thought we got too comfortable in the game.”
In the third period, Ryan Reaves picked up his third goal of the season at 14:25 to cut the deficit to 4-2.
The Knights’ Jonathan Marchessault hit an empty net at 18:23 to extend the lead to 5-2.
Nicolas Roy scored with 31 seconds left on the game clock for the 6-2 final count on the scoreboard.
“We definitely played a hard road game, and that’s what we knew we had to do coming in here,” Vegas’ Shea Theodore said. “They have a lot of highly skilled players who like to fill the net and I thought we did a great job.”
Ilya Samsonov made 26 saves in the loss.
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