Toronto Maple Leafs: Auston Matthews 100th Point and Other Milestones

The Toronto Maple Leafs powered to a very strong result against the Washington Capitals on Thursday night taking the game 7-3.

Countless Toronto Maple Leafs players celebrated various milestones as the team thoroughly out-played, for the most part, their opponent.

Given their loss against the lowly Buffalo Sabres a couple of days earlier, this result was vital in bouncing back.

The fact that the team managed to do so speaks volumes. What speaks more this season though is the sheer number of individual milestones being achieved.

Toronto Maple Leafs Players Hitting Some Big Milestones

The most obvious milestone achieved versus Washington was Auston Matthews notching his 100th point with an assist on Michael Bunting’s first-period goal.

While you might have expected, especially in a game where the Leafs grabbed seven goals, that Matthews scored his 100th point with a goal, that was not the case. By the end of the game though, he had a second point; his 101st this season.

Another milestone moment, especially given the importance of it in killing any Washington momentum was Ilya Lyubushkin’s first goal as a Toronto Maple Leafs player.

Grabbing the goal with an absolute blast  just 13 seconds after John Carlson opened the scoring for the Capitals; not only was it important but it also, somewhat remarkably, marked just his second career NHL goal.

William Nylander was keen not to miss out either; he grabbed two goals with the second seeing him hit the 30-goal mark in an NHL season for the first time since being drafted by the Leafs in 2014.

Michael Bunting grabbed a pair of goals too, breaking a pretty lengthy goalless streak while playing his 100th NHL game.

Bunting worked incredibly hard to reach that milestone game, especially when you consider he was also a 2014 draft pick (albeit for Arizona). By comparison, Nylander is sitting at 431 NHL games at this point.

The longest-serving Toronto Maple Leafs player, Morgan Rielly also got in on the act with his 300th (and 301st) assist.

Perhaps the most remarkable statistic to come from this game was the fact this is the first game since January 7, 2011 that had three Toronto Maple Leafs players score multiple goals in the same game.

For those counting, the multiple goal-scorers were Ilya Mikheyev, William Nylander and Michael Bunting; each of which were hunting for a hat-trick for much of the third period.

Before the season is over, there’s certainly a few other milestones to be reached. Perhaps no night will see more in one game though than this convincing win did!