The Toronto Maple Leafs put forth a strong offensive effort in their first meeting with the Tampa Bay Lightning, but the difference in the battle of the league’s two best records was the acrobatic goaltending of Andrei Vasilevskiy, who frustrated the Leafs in a 4-1 Lightning at Amalie Arena on Thursday.
The Lightning extended their Atlantic Division lead to eight points with the win, due mostly to Vasilevskiy and an opportunistic offense that rebounded from the Leafs taking an early lead on a Kasperi Kapanen goal with a pair of tallies on special teams from Anthony Cirelli and Nikita Kucherov and two goals from Alex Killorn and Tyler Johnson in the final seconds of the middle frame.
Vasilevskiy made his return to the Tampa lineup after missing a month with a broken foot and single handedly held the Leafs at bay, keeping the game tied in the second, stopping 23 shots and thwarting Toronto’s power play, which went 0 for 6 on the night.
“We had lots of opportunity here tonight, no question. Their goaltending was real good. We had a good opportunity on the power play(s), we didn't finish.” Leafs head coach Mike Babcock said after the game. “That got us out of the game, which is disappointing because we thought we did lots of good things.”
Frederik Andersen did not have a particularly strong outing for the second time this week against a division rival, allowing four goals on 21 shots, but was victimized by miscues made in front of him. Cirelli’s tying shorthanded goal was the result of William Nylander losing the puck at center ice and Jake Gardiner being out of position after the turnover.
The Leafs goalie made a nice save reaching back on a Kucherov one-timer early in the second, but video review revealed the shot carried Andersen’s glove over the goal line. The coup de grace for Toronto were the pair of goals in the last minute of the second, as a lost neutral zone puck battle led to Killorn’s backhander making it 3-1.
Babcock puzzlingly put out the fourth line following the goal and after Travis Dermott was caught up ice trying to respond to the late Lightning goal, the makeshift unit of Tyler Ennis, Par Lindholm and Frederik Gauthier could not regain control of the puck in the defensive zone, leading to Johnson’s goal with 1.4 seconds left.
The suspension of Zach Hyman made it necessary for Gauthier to be in the lineup, but because he has been a significant liability playing the wing in a few instances, Babcock was forced to play Lindholm out of position and flip Ennis to the right side to accommodate playing “The Goat” at center for 6:31 on Thursday.
The return of Hyman on Saturday will likely reunite the fourth line of Ennis, Lindholm and Connor Brown and return the Leafs 2013 top pick to the press box on Saturday, but his place on the 23-man roster has to be in question going forward, based on a lack of significant contribution and players like Trevor Moore, Carl Grundstrom, Mason Marchment, Pierre Engvall and Jeremy Bracco in the AHL appearing ready to make the jump.
It is possible that Andersen’s level of performance dipping slightly this week has more to do with the difficulty of the opposition than fatigue, but once again there has to be some concern in the level of confidence that Babcock has in backup Garret Sparks and whether the Leafs head coach is hesitant to lighten the workload of his starter and keep him fresh.
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