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The Toronto Maple Leafs once again showed their ability to bounce back from a subpar effort, rallying with a pair of late third-period goals in a 4-3 victory over the New Jersey Devils at the Prudential Center on Tuesday. The Leafs went 3-2-0 on their five-game road trip with a nip and tuck battle that saw Michael Bunting score his 20th goal to tie the game, and Auston Matthews notch the game-winner on the power play with 2:53 remaining in regulation.
Calle Jarnkrok and Mitch Marner also scored for Toronto and Ilya Samsonov made 30 saves for his 24th victory of the season to keep the Leafs five points ahead of the Tampa Bay Lightning in the race for second place in the Atlantic Division.
"34 SNAPS IT HOME!"
— LeafsJellyHD (@LeafsJelly) March 8, 2023
Auston Matthews 29th of the Season vs New Jersey Devils courtesy of Joe Bowen and Jim Ralph. #LeafsForever @BonsieTweets @Jim_Ralph
7/3/2023 pic.twitter.com/2EOrzKZpnr
The game was the exact opposite of the loss in Vancouver on Saturday, in that the Leafs started slow and were outshot 15-5 in the opening period, but rebounded and scored the first goal as Jarnkrok scored his 14th of the season on a setup from William Nylander. Erik Haula scored the first of two goals to tie it late in the middle frame.
Marner put the Leafs ahead with his third short-handed goal of the season, but the Devils responded on the same man advantage with Ondrej Palat’s goal to tie the game and then took the lead on Haula’s deflection past Samsonov.
Pluses and Minuses
Plus
Toronto was able to stay with the Devils in spite of being without John Tavares and Ryan O’Reilly. Sam Lafferty assisted on Jarnkrok’s opener and showed his excellent skating ability in 13:28 as the Leafs second line center. The pairing of TJ Brodie and Jake McCabe was excellent in a shutdown role for over 22 minutes.
Minus
Pontus Holmberg struggled in his first game since being demoted after the O’Reilly trade. The young center played only 6:50 in the game but took a careless high-sticking double minor on Palat late in the second period.
Justin Holl once again showed his propensity for being a liability on defense in the contest, as he was on for all three Devils goals and directly responsible for two of them, vacating his position on Palat’s power-play goal and failing to clear the puck from in front of the net on Haula’s first tally. Holl made a nice pass to spring Kampf on Bunting’s tying marker, but with the Leafs having other options after the addition of Luke Schenn, there should be some consideration for sitting the big righty when the post-season begins.
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