William Nylander extended his point streak to 14 and the Toronto Maple Leafs defeated the Calgary Flames 5-4 on Friday night in a shootout.
Max Domi played the hero with the winning goal in the fifth round of the shootout. It was Domi’s first career shootout goal in 10 attempts.
Nylander became 24e player in NHL history to record at least one point in each of his first 14 games of a season. The record is 51 games and is held by Wayne Gretzky.
Friday night, Nylander finished his game with two goals and an assist. Nylander scored on both the power play and the penalty kill, becoming the third Leafs player to achieve this feat in the last 20 years after Mitch Marner and Ilya Mikheyev.
Nylander now has 9 goals and 21 points in 14 games this season.
In the case of the Maple Leafs, the team has allowed at least four goals in each of its last four outings. Goalkeeper Joseph Woll finished the match with 24 saves on 28 shots.
Woll made several spectacular saves during the overtime period to allow the Maple Leafs to stay in the Leafs game.
Calle Jarnkrok and John Tavares also scored for Toronto, while Flames goals were scored by Connor Zary, Nikita Zadorov, AJ Greer and Martin Pospisil.
Before the start of the game, the Leafs held a presentation at Scotiabank Arena to mark the induction of the newest members of the Hockey Hall of Fame.
Nylander doesn’t slow down
Nylander started his excellent game just over three minutes into the first period. While the Maple Leafs were playing on the power play, Nylander made a great individual move to then slide the puck into the back of the net and open the scoring.
After seeing the Flames tie the game on Zary’s goal, Toronto responded with the next three goals. Jarnkrok first restored the lead to the Maple Leafs before the end of the first period, then Nylander doubled the lead with a good wrist shot while shorthanded after causing a turnover.
A few minutes later, Nylander made a superb back pass to Tavares in front of the net and the Maple Leafs captain increased Toronto’s lead to three goals.
Goals from Zadorov and Greer before the end of the second period, however, allowed the Flames to reduce the gap to a single goal after 40 minutes of play. Pospisil then tied the game 4-4 at the start of the third period with his second goal of the season.
Domi and Marner scored in the shootout for Toronto, while only Yegor Sharangovich found the back of the net for the Flames.
Calgary goaltender Dan Vladar made 32 saves in the loss.
The Maple Leafs will return to action on Saturday evening to face the Vancouver Canucks. The Flames will face the Ottawa Senators, before heading to Montreal to face the Canadiens on Tuesday.
Devils’ vain comeback
The Washington Capitals scored twice in a span of 15 seconds in the first to escape with a 4-2 victory over the New Jersey Devils.
These are the two fastest goals for the Capitals since December 19. Only the Los Angeles Kings have scored two goals faster this season, hitting the target twice in 12 seconds.
In the first period, Quebecer Nicolas Aube-Kubel opened the scoring with his first of the season in his first game at 10:22 before seeing Beck Malenstyn imitate him 15 seconds later with his first of the campaign as well. He was recalled by the team following the injury to Anthony Mantha.
In the second, Evgeny Kuznetsov took advantage of a play started by Tom Wilson and Alex Ovechkin to give the Caps a three-goal priority.
Trailing by three goals, the Devils showed their teeth with two goals in less than two minutes to give another meaning to the match thanks to the nets of Timo Meier and Dawson Mercer. However, they were unable to outwit Charlie Lindgren again.
Evgeny Kuznetsov finally ended the game with an empty-net goal, his third of the campaign.
The Devils were without their leading scorer Jack Hughes for a third game in a row. He is injured in the right shoulder.
They were also missing captain Nico Hischier, absent for a sixth meeting in a row. He suffered an illegal hit to the head from the Sabres’ Connor Clifton on October 27.
The Hurricanes didn’t see the storm coming
The Florida Panthers defeated the Carolina Hurricanes 5-2.
Matthew Tkachuk and Carter Verhaeghe each scored a goal and had an assist.
The Panthers have won 10 of the last 12 meetings between the two teams.
Uvis Balinskis, Aleksander Barkov and Kevin Stenlund in an empty net were the authors of the other scorers.
Balinskis became the first Latvia player to score since Karlis Skrastins in February 2011.
Sam Reinhart had two assists.
Sergei Bobrovsky blocked 28 pucks for his fourth straight win.
For the Hurricanes, Jesperi Kotkaniemi and Sebastian Aho responded.
Kotkaniemi’s goal came 80 seconds into the first, marking his team’s quickest goal this season. Ironically, the former Montreal Canadiens also scored his team’s fastest goal last year after just 20 seconds against New Jersey in December 2022.
Antti Raanta made 29 saves.
Sabers keep Wild at bay
Jeff Skinner scored his seventh goal of the season in a 3-2 Buffalo Sabers victory over the Minnesota Wild.
Skinner was also an accomplice on JJ Peterka’s goal, which proved to be the winning goal.
Henri Jokiharju opened the scoring for the Sabres.
Both Wild goals were scored on the power play. In the first, Kirill Kaprizov scored his fifth of the season while Joel Eriksson Ek was the author of his eighth. Kaprizov, who climbed to fifth place in his team’s history with his 119th goal, also collected an assist on his team’s other goal.
Mats Zuccarello participated in both of his team’s goals in the defeat.
Quebec goalie Devon Levi did well in front of the Sabres cage. He faced 35 shots. In defeat. Filip Gustavsson gave up three times on 25 shots.
