Toronto squandered a two-goal lead, falling to San Jose 3-2 in overtime Thursday night at Scotiabank Arena.
Dennis Hildeby continued his strong play in goal. William Nylander responded to his line demotion with two assists, and the Leafs actually scored a power-play goal. Here endeth the good news.
In a back-and-forth contest with good scoring chances often met with better goaltending, Toronto went out to an early lead. Dakota Joshua tipped in a Jake McCabe snipe at the 14:33 mark of the first period. The winger’s fifth on the season put the Leafs up 1-0.
Toronto added a rare power-play goal in the second. With five and a half minutes remaining in the period, Auston Matthews one-timed a Nylander pass from just above the goal line, beating Sharks’ goaltender Alex Nedeljkovic for the two-goal advantage.
Then it was San Jose’s turn. The Sharks responded with a goal 59 seconds after the Matthews tally. Dmitry Orlov scored his first of the year to trim the margin in half. John Klingberg had all day out above the circles, eventually finding Orlov cutting in. The defenceman rifled a shot over Hildeby to make it 2-1.
Toronto held on to its narrow lead all the way until the final minutes of regulation, but after they failed three times to clear the zone, Kingberg made them pay with a seeing-eye shot past Hideby, tying the game and forcing overtime.
The first half of the extra period was relatively tame, but at 2:49 the Sharks converted a two-on-one for the game-winner. Hildeby denied the initial shot from William Eklund but could not stop the rebound from Alexander Wennberg.
Next Up: Edmonton travels to Toronto to take on the Leafs Saturday Night at Scotiabank Arena.
