Campbell Closes the Door

 

Saturday night Toronto squared off for game 2 of their back-to-back set against the Calgary Flames. Toronto who managed just one win in their last seven games would turn to Jack Campbell giving him the start and Calgary would counter with Dave Rittich who so far this season has had the Leafs number.

The game started with fast paced end to end action and both teams but both goalies were making key saves to keep the score level. Midway through the opening period Milan Lucic would get called for boarding after driving Auston Matthews into the boards giving Toronto the first power play of the game but Toronto despite spending most of the power play in the Flames end The Leafs unable to find the opening goal of the contest. Late in the first period however for the first time in quite a while the Toronto would open the scoring as Calgary’s Dillon Dube fails to clear the zone, Jake Muzzin would keep the puck in play sending the puck to Jason Spezza who would send the puck over the glove side shoulder of Rittich to give Toronto the 1-0 lead with his 7^th of the season. Toronto would carry into the first intermission.

The second period would be like the first and once again these two teams would be trading chances and both teams would collect multiple power play chances but the Penalty Killing units would remain perfect. Toronto would double their lead at the 16-minute mark of the second period when Alex Galchenyuk and John Tavares along with Zach Hyman would rush into the offensive zone Galchenyuk would send a wing-to-wing pass to Tavares who would move the puck along to Hyman, Zach Hyman would go behind the goal and wrap the puck around and passed Calgary’s goalie for the important second goal. There was also a milestone on Hyman’s 11^th of the campaign as with his secondary assist Alex Galchenyuk would collect his first point as a member of the Toronto Maple Leafs in just his second game.

With Toronto 20 minutes away from ending this frustrating losing streak they knew Calgary would come out in full force looking to get back into the contest and that is exactly what they saw as Calgary spent a lot more time trying to create traffic in front of Campbell, but he would manage to keep Calgary from getting on the scoreboard with some important timely saves. One of his saves in particular would see Jack Campbell show his best 1980’s impression and with Calgary looking at an open net the Leafs netminder would stack the pads on a highlight reel kick save to keep the puck out and the 2-0 lead intact. The final horn would sound, and the Toronto Maple Leafs would finally pick up their 20^th win of the season to snap this annoying losing streak. This would be Toronto’s first regulation win since March 3^rd when Toronto shut out the Edmonton Oilers a game Campbell started in as well.

 

Time for my thoughts on this game.

 

I thought Toronto from the very start of the game were ready and playing with focus and a purpose and with the Penalty kill being a concern for the Leafs during this current stretch but last night Toronto would go a perfect three for three while playing a man down. Defensively Toronto was much better as well because they did a much better job using active sticks and blocking shots from getting to their goal. Now even though this was a better effort there were still some things they need to improve. Toronto needs to clean up the turnovers in their end because there were times last night that although they did not hurt Toronto there will be opponents that will capitalize on those given opportunities. Toronto has seen their power play dry up recently and despite lots of zone time and many high-quality chances they have only managed one goal in their last fifteen chances.

 

In closing Toronto now heads into another four-day break giving the team more time to work on correcting their special teams play and this break gives Freddie Andersen more time to recover from his lower body injury. Finally, with Jack Campbell stopping all 31 shots he faced Saturday night for his 4^th win in 4 starts he is fully capable to go on a run as the starting goalie while Andersen recovers. Toronto is back in action Thursday when they travel to Ottawa to battle the Senators and I believe it is safe to say fans will see Jack Campbell in the goal for his fifth start.