Thursday night the Toronto Maple Leafs dropped their fourth contest in their last five games, this time to the Florida Panthers by a score of 3-2.
The Toronto Maple Leafs played a fine game, finishing with the better expected goals percentage, a slight edge in scoring chances and a 9-3 edge in dangerous chances, while Florida possessed the puck the most and the teams each had 21 shots. (stats naturalstattrick.com).
Unfortunately, considering what is expected of the Leafs star players, this was not a good game. Other than John Tavares, who at least scored, the Leafs stars were mostly invisible and could not generate much throughout the game despite the Panthers being without Matthew Tkachuk, Aaron Ekblad and Brad Marchand.
The end result was a loss in the biggest game of the season, and now the Leafs are four points out of the division lead.
Toronto Maple Leafs stars go invisible, closely lose biggest game of the season
The Maple Leafs looked good out of the gates to start the contest with an early one-time goal by John Tavares that was created by Calle Järnkrok driving to the net drawing both defenders leaving the former captain open at the side to put it past Sergei Bobrovsky for William Nylander to make a slick pass.
Max Domi had arguably his best game of the season as he dished out one of the bigger Maple Leafs hits of the year on Carter Verhaeghe which led to him rag dolling Nate Schmidt in a fight. The second generation Maple Leaf would later add to his night by scoring early in the third period to bring the team within a goal, which Järnkrok recorded the primary assist on.
Both Domi and Järnkrok were the team's most effective forwards on the night which is good to see, however, when the coach uses his best players in a defensive role, you are not apt to win many games. Outside of Tavares goal two minutes into the game, Nylander coasted around the night waiting for a puck to come to him that just never happened, while Tavares made continuous poor decisions including losing the puck twice in the final minute of the game while trying to create offense on his own.
The top line of Matthews, Marner and Knies put up great stats and held the Panthers from doing anything when they played. Scoring chances were 9-2 with Matthews on the ice. High-danger chances were 7-0 in their favour. These numbers are great, but Matthews had only two shots and the Leafs didn't score when they were on the ice.
The Leafs first line was hard matched against the Panthers line of Verhaeghe, Reinhart and Barkov and completely neutralized them, which is good. But the Leafs were at home, they didn't need this to be the matchup, and ultimately, Florida appreciated the trade-off and won the game.
One of the biggest trade acquisitions this season for the club was acquiring Brandon Carlo from the Boston Bruins in what many think is to play with the longest tenured Maple Leaf Morgan Rielly. Carlo's first two games on the Leafs were nothing short of brutal, but last night the Leafs outshot the Panthers in his minutes and he posted a solid 58% xGoals rating.
Morgan Rielly also had a good game for the Leafs last night, finishing with an 72% xGoals rating while the Leafs had four dangerous chances and allowed zero when he was on the ice. Unfortunately, with Mathews and Marner occupied defensively, Rielly was unable to add to the offense.
With the 3-2 loss, the Maple Leafs now fall four points behind the Panthers for top spot in the division, while holding just a two point lead on the Lightning for home-ice. The Maple Leasf now take on the Ottawa Senators on Saturday and a regulation loss would bring their provincial rivals within four points of pushing them down into a Wild Card position.