Toronto Maple Leafs: Observations from 4-3 OT win over Montreal

Holy Mackinaw, the kid’s done it again!

This was the call from legendary Leafs play-by-play man Joe Bowen on Auston Matthews’ overtime winner.

It’s hard to narrow down a single call that is the best of Jow Bowen’s career. In the case of this era of the Leafs, however, this could be the one that people go back to.

Matthews followed up his heroics from a week ago with another bullet of a shot over the shoulder of Carey Price to win the Buds the game. Matthews and his linemates looked great in this game, but it was the centreman who settled the game for his team.

However, Matthews had another beautiful goal off the rush in the first period.

Matthews led all forwards on the Leafs in ice time at 20:22 and won 69 per cent of his faceoffs. He didn’t shy away from contact with Weber and it was one of those games where the puck just seemed to find Matthews.

He is the only Leafs player to register a point in every game this season, so expect Matthews to keep dazzling for the Buds going forward.

Back End Bounces Back

This was a big game for the Leafs defensive core as well as Frederik Andersen to bounce back after a bad showing against the Devils on Wednesday.

They came back in a big way and kept the game close. The biggest difference looked to be the return of Connor Carrick to the lineup. The third pairing defender missed Wednesday’s game with an injury but came back and gave a boost to the backend.

He played with the same tenacity as always while providing a steady base for Andreas Borgman.

Morgan Rielly, and Nikita Zaitsev had steady performances and pitched in at both ends of the ice but the biggest performance by far came from Andersen.

The Leafs starter had a rough start to the game, allowing two goals in the first period. However, he bounced back and made several key saves down the stretch to keep the game tied at three going into overtime.

In the extra frame, Andersen sprawled out to block a rebound that bounced off Tomas Plekanec. That was his biggest save of the night and set the table for William Nylander‘s rush up the ice to set up the Matthews game-winner.

Andersen needed a good game more than anyone tonight, and he came up big when his team needed it most.

One last thing

Something that was swept under the rug with the Leafs win was that it was the 600th in Mike Babcock’s career.

He needs just 14 more wins to surpass Jacques Lemaire for 15th in wins by a coach. Congrats on the milestone Mike.

Next: Zach Hyman doing his part

The Maple Leafs get their chance at revenge when they travel to Washington on Tuesday to meet up with Alex Ovechkin and the Capitals.