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Leafs burned by incomplete effort in Philadelphia |
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While there is no disputing the Toronto Maple Leafs success this season, their recent trend of being overly dependent on their goaltending and not controlling the play for the majority of games has to be a warning sign of future problems.
Unlike their victories over Pittsburgh and Edmonton last weekend, the Leafs were unable to hold onto a tenuous lead, as Sean Couturier broke a 2-2 tie with 2:55 remaining in the third period to give the Philadelphia Flyers a 4-2 victory over the Leafs at the Wells Fargo Center on Tuesday.
Patrick Marleau and James van Riemsdyk scored and Frederik Andersen made 35 saves for Toronto, who had their three-game winning streak snapped and lost their first game without center Auston Matthews in the lineup.
The Flyers opened the scoring in the first period after Marleau was kicked out of the face-off, which drew the ire of Leafs head coach Mike Babcock. Couturier won the draw against Zach Hyman and set up Claude Giroux for a one-timer past Andersen.
Toronto responded to even the score just 27 seconds later, as Marleau scored his 11th of the season on a wrist shot that beat Brian Elliott on the short side.
Toronto began to lose a territorial edge in the middle frame, as the Flyers outshot them 14-7, but took advantage of their only man advantage of the game, as van Riemsdyk tipped in a Morgan Rielly point shot to give the Leafs the lead.
The Leafs appeared to be on their heels and content to try to preserved their lead in the third, but let Philadelphia take control of the game and pelt Andersen with 18 shots in the final 20 minutes of regulation.
After an attempt by Andersen to clear the puck was thwarted, Travis Konecny’s shot deflected off of two defenders and past the Leafs goalie to tie the game.
The Leafs tried to hold on for at least a point on the road, but squandered that opportunity as Jake Gardiner failed to keep the puck in the Flyers zone and was caught up the ice as Giroux set up Couturier for the game winner.
“(Sitting back) wasn't our plan, that's not what we talked about. We stopped pushing for sure, but even then I thought we were in a great spot.” Babcock said after the game. “One that went off somebody in our zone and ended up in our net. The other one is ‘just be above your guy’ coming back, simple. Even with that I still thought we were in a good spot to get a point or two points, we just didn't execute. We've got to do a better job.”
There was no clear update on Matthews from the Leafs head coach on Tuesday morning, not even to confirm that the 20-year-old suffered a concussion after colliding with Rielly in Pittsburgh on Saturday.
Matthews status is “day-to-day”, which could mean that the Leafs leading scorer will not play in either of the back-to-back games against Minnesota and Detroit later this week.
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Toronto Maple Leafs Blogger • 
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