KHUDOBIN STYMIES PUNCHLESS LEAFS’ OFFENCE
Club continues to have trouble scoring goals at home
When the Toronto Maple Leafs were played off the ice after two periods to Bad Moon Rising, it was evident where their night was headed.
A second straight loss where they could not score when it counted at home, as frustrations mounted while running into a defensive buzz saw at even strength. The Dallas Stars came away with a 2-1 win Thursday.
After one-goal winger Patrick Marleau hit the post on an empty net, he finally settled the puck down and bagged one on Toronto’s fourth power play of the night. But the normally reliable John Tavares and Mitch Marner were among others whiffing in the slot against Dallas backup goalie Anton Khudobin, who gloved a Marner shot near the buzzer to preserve the win.
Forward juggling by coach Mike Babcock did not make a difference in the absence of injured Auston Matthews and the missing William Nylander, while secondary scoring remains elusive.
Grumblings about lack of penalty calls on the opposition didn’t hold water as the Leafs had four chances, two in the third period.
In dropping their fifth home game of eight, they have only six goals the past five games on Bay St. and now head to Pittsburgh which had a 3-0 shutout here two weeks ago.
When they failed to score in the middle frame, they matched the 1994-95 Florida Panthers as the only team to be silenced in five straight second periods on home ice.
Coming into the game, only two other NHL clubs had as many or fewer power play opportunities than the Leafs’ 31, but at least Toronto was clicking early in the month. Its first three chances had a couple of close calls, but nothing sustained as the unit is now at 2-for-16 since the team lost four of the past six overall.
With Frederik Andersen pulled following Marleau’s goal with 3:09 to go, the Leafs came in waves, but it was too late. Marner came as close as anyone on special teams, during a kill on a rush up the right side and a break to the net that Khudobin stayed with as Marner tried to go low.
Andersen stopped a 2-on-1 with the game scoreless in the second before he, too, succumbed, Jamie Benn with a ridiculous tip of a rising Tyler Seguin shot.
Devin Shore got behind the Leaf defence to make it 2-0 in the third.
Three Carolina scouts took in Thursday’s match, after the Metropolitan Division club doublestaffed a couple of recent Toronto home games in what’s believed to be due diligence for a possible pitch on Nylander. With less than a month to go before the restricted free agent must have a deal to play in the NHL this season, a reciprocal target for Toronto could be defenceman Brett Pesce, who is playing almost 20 minutes a game for the Canes.
The Leafs staged a nice presentation for Ron Hainsey’s 1,000th game, bringing his wife and three young children to centre ice, where NHL executive Jim Gregory gave him a Tiffany crystal memento and Darryl Sittler delivered an engraved silver stick.