Toronto fans booed Mitch Marner throughout his homecoming game, and his former teammates managed to keep him off the score sheet, but it was still not enough to stop the Golden Knights. Vegas defeated the Leafs 6-3 on Friday night.
Marner was not the only one making a return to Scotiabank Arena; goalie Anthony Stolarz was back in net, manning the crease for the Maple Leafs after missing the last 33 games due to an upper-body injury. He, too, received an icee reception, not from the Maple Leafs’ faithful, but rather from the Golden Knights’ players who kept shooting pucks past him.
The onslaught started early. Jack Eichel opened the scoring for Vegas 1:06 into the first period. Mark Stone made a beautiful backdoor pass in front of the Toronto net to the wide-open centremen who wristed the puck by a diving Stolarz for the 1-0 lead.
Keegan Kolesar doubled the margin with his 4th goal of the season, smacking home a rebound past Stolarz at 4:31.
John Tavares put Toronto on the board 13 seconds into the middle frame. Mathew Knies fired a shot that caromed off the post and behind Golden Knights’ goaltender Adin Hill. Tavares found the puck before Hill did and tapped it in to make 2-1.
The Knights responded quickly to the Leafs’ tally. Pavel Dorofeyev took advantage of a failed Knies’ clearing attempt, ripped one off the post, retrieved the puck between two Leafs’, and beat Stolarz near-side to make it 3-1 at 3:32. Less than two minutes later Bradean Bowman took advantage of a flat-footed Toronto denfense pairing, shook free, and roofed a puck top-shelf to make it 4-2.
Scott Laughlin narrowed the margin with his 8th on the season, a sneaky backhander on a breakaway that barely snuck by Hill, cutting it to 4-2 at 10:04.
The second period scoring frenzy continued. Bobby McMann drew the Leafs within one with a deflection of a Max Domi shot that tricked Hill and ended up behind the goal line.
Vegas took a 4-3 lead into the third, but before Toronto could find the equalizer, Stone put the game out of reach, converting off a two-on-one at 15:11 to push the lead to 5-3, then adding an empty net at 19:01 to make the final 6-3.
Next up, the Maple Leafs host a Sunday matinee game against the Colorado Avalanche.
