Toronto Maple Leafs: 3 observations from 8-5 win over Rangers
By Austin Owens
2) Shades of last season
When Mats Zuccarello scored the Rangers’ fifth goal of the night to tie the game, most Leafs fans got a very uneasy feeling in their stomachs. After all, the Leafs made it common practice last season to give up multi-goal leads.
Those games usually didn’t end in the Leafs favour. As such, with no momentum going their way, it was hard to feel positive going into the third period.
However, this isn’t the same Toronto Maple Leafs team as last season. Tyler Bozak found the back of the net off a Jake Gardiner feed to put the Leafs ahead once again. Leo Komarov followed with another notch just under three minutes later.
Leo Komarov gets the credit for this one and the #Leafs are up 7-5 over the #NYRangers.#RogersNHLLive pic.twitter.com/WKAzq9wbYV
— Rogers NHL LIVE (@RogersNHLLive) October 8, 2017
The Leafs were on cruise control from thereon, after looking bleak for a portion of the game. Ondrej Pavelec relieved Lundqvist to start the second and shut the door through 20 minutes. Pavelec looked good to start the third as well, but things started to get away from the backup after the sixth Leafs goal.
Hopefully, the blown leads don’t become a regular occurrence again. Babcock surely won’t want to go through another season of defensive breakdowns with multi-goal leads.