Nazem Kadri was disturbing and aggravating at Air Canada Center on Tuesday night, but unlike times in the past when he brought about those feelings from some of the Toronto fan base or his coaches, the Leafs center thoroughly frustrated superstar Connor McDavid and scored the opening goal and game-winner in a 3-2 Maple Leafs overtime victory over the Oilers.
“(Kadri) did a real good job, his line did a good job. McDavid played 8:15 in the first period so that helped us too because that's a lot of minutes,” Leafs head coach Mike Babcock said after the game. “That helped us because Naz had only played five – he didn't penalty kill. He was allowed to be fresher.”
In a game billed as a matchup between McDavid and Leafs rookie Auston Matthews, head coach Mike Babcock put the 26-year-old veteran head-to-head with the NHL’s leading scorer. Kadri was physical with the speedy 19-year-old throughout the game, which seemed to frustrate him and drew the attention of linemate Milan Lucic.
“You don't want McDavid to walk all over you. Certainly he's a player capable of doing that.” Kadri said. “He can embarrass you when he gets time and space so I just tried to limit that from him and stay on top of him as much as I could there.”
Connor Brown assisted on Kadri’s opening tally and put forth his best effort of the season, playing 16:22 on the club’s second line. Nikita Soshnikov registered a helper on Ben Smith’s first goal and was effective in a team-low 7:35, but did get penalized for a hit to the head of Oilers winger Benoit Pouilot.
Frederik Andersen faced 46 Oilers shots on Tuesday, showed better rebound control and appeared more comfortable in his eighth start of the season, but did get caught out of the net on Anton Lander’s first period goal.
The Leafs are in Buffalo to face the division rival Sabres on Thursday. In spite of injuries to forwards Jack Eichel and Evander Kane, Buffalo is over .500 (4-3-2) and winners of their last three, including a 2-1 win in Minnesota on Tuesday.
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The demotion of winger Milan Michalek last week was yet another example of the Maple Leafs not having the services of a veteran player with a high salary.
Currently, the club has $29 Million in salary either on injured reserve or assigned to the American Hockey League (if you include the unresolved Jared Cowen buyout situation) and are only getting $1.85 Million in cap relief with the healthy Michalek, Brooks Laich and Colin Greening sent down to the Marlies.
GM Lou Lamoriello has not to this point assigned any of the long-term injury players (Nathan Horton, Joffrey Lupul or Stephane Robidas) to LTIR and Toronto is currently $388,740 under the $73 Million salary cap.
This gives the Leafs a lot of maneuverability throughout the season if a trade comes up that would require room under the salary cap.
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