The Toronto Maple Leafs were playing like their four-game winning streak was going to come to an end early on in Tuesday’s game against the Philadelphia Flyers. They were outshot 10-2 in the first period by the Flyers, heading into the second period down 1-0, and only had five shots on goal by the midway mark of the second period.
Luckily, the Maple Leafs took advantage of the Flyers’ league-worst team save percentage (SV%) of .869 and responded quickly to both goals. John Tavares notched a power play marker early in the second period to tie the game at 1 and Auston Matthews waited only 41 seconds to tie the game at 2 after the Flyers took the lead. With the latter’s assist on the Tavares’ goal and his second-period tying goal, he added an interesting milestone to his resume.
Leafs Auston Matthews is the fastest American-born player in NHL history with 200 career multi-point games pic.twitter.com/sLVsm4oBQt
— Sportsnet Stats (@SNstats) January 8, 2025
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Scoring the game-winner for the Maple Leafs with six minutes to go in the third period was Matthew Knies. The Leafs’ 2021 second-round pick has continued his torrid stretch ever since busting his slump in style on Saturday against the Boston Bruins when he notched five points. He scored a goal in both games of the home-and-home against Philadelphia, including his goal on Tuesday, which came in the form of his quickly developing bread-and-butter – the tip-in.
STAY HOT MATTY 🔥 pic.twitter.com/d9tFn4Iy6p
— Toronto Maple Leafs (@MapleLeafs) January 8, 2025
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Knies has officially surpassed his career-high of 15 goals with his 16th on the season, giving him 26 points in 40 games and essentially cementing himself as one of the team’s most reliable secondary scorers by this point of the season.
Although Knies came up clutch and the Maple Leafs’ star forwards did their part again, we can’t talk about the game without giving Joseph Woll his flowers. He’s continued to provide the Leafs with the stability in the crease that they so badly needed since Anthony Stolarz went down with an injury in December, and Tuesday night’s win marked his fifth-straight victory. He kept things at bay early in the game when the Leafs couldn’t execute a simple play without turning the puck over and made the crucial saves at the end of the game when the Flyers started to press.
The Maple Leafs are now tied for first place in the Eastern Conference and will look to broaden the gap when they visit the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday.
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