Leafs rally to beat Oilers in overtime

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Connor McDavid got his points against the Maple Leafs on Saturday night.

That didn’t change the outcome versus Toronto.

Four weeks after keeping the Edmonton Oilers superstar off the scoresheet in a three-game sweep in Alberta, the Leafs beat the Oilers again, this time capping an enthralling comeback to register a 4-3 overtime decision at Scotiabank Arena.

Auston Matthews got the winner at 54 seconds of the extra period when his shot pin-balled off the Oilers’ Leon Draisaitl and Darnell Nurse and past goaltender Mike Smith.

The goal was Matthews’ first in six games and 22nd of the season, moving him one ahead of McDavid for the National Hockey League lead.

“I’m going to take that, for sure,” said Matthews, who had a Leafs-high seven shots on goal. “Not quite how we drew it up. It’s frustrating when the puck is not going in, but I just try to stay positive and continue to push and shoot the puck and continue to think the next one is going in.

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“Resiliency, we just stuck with it. We clawed our way back.”

The Leafs trailed 3-1 entering the third period, down a couple of goals thanks to a pair of McDavid assists. Toronto, in the opener of the two-game set between the clubs, scored twice in a span of four minutes 17 seconds to tie the game.

Both goals came from the reunited trio of John Tavares between Alex Galchenyuk and William Nylander, put back together by coach Sheldon Keefe after Wayne Simmonds started the game on the line in place of Galchenyuk.

Nylander scored the tying goal at 16:38 when he blasted a shot past Smith off a scramble. That came after Tavares scored on a pass from Galchenyuk, who also assisted on the Nylander goal, at 12:21.

“We didn’t have much happening for us on any of the lines in the second period, so I needed to change some things,” Keefe said. “Galchenyuk hadn’t done anything to come off (the Tavares) line. He had played quite well.

“To see the line get rewarded, for John to get a huge goal and then followed up by Will, it’s really good and you can’t ignore Galchenyuk’s contributions.”

The Leafs’ 46 points put them back in sole possession of first place in the North Division, two up on Winnipeg (who played later on Saturday in Calgary) and three ahead of Edmonton.

The Leafs continue to struggle on the power play and have gone 18 in a row without scoring. They failed to score on two power plays on Saturday, but Keefe said he liked the process and expects goals to start coming.

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After Pierre Engvall put the Leafs up 1-0 early in the second, the Oilers scored three.

Nurse scored on a stoppable shot at 6:47 after taking a pass from McDavid, and we hope you caught a replay of the second Oilers goal if you didn’t see it as it happened.

McDavid beat defenceman Justin Holl in a race for the puck, and then passed across the ice, enabling Draisaitl to one-time a shot past Jack Campbell. McDavid might have been the only person in the building who had an idea Draisaitl was going to be in the right spot. That goal came at 14:05.

Ex-Leaf Tyson Barrie scored the Oilers’ third goal after a fine feed from Draisaitl.

Campbell had to deal with just 20 shots, and though the goals by Draisaitl and Barrie were sharp, the netminder was critical of himself.

“I’m not going to sugarcoat it: I just didn’t have it,” Campbell said. “That’s what a really great team does, is pick guys up. They never gave up and kept battling, and we came away with a huge two points.

“I didn’t like my game one bit.”

Count on Campbell, now 6-0-0, to rebound. He won’t have any choice, as the Leafs’ net will be his for the foreseeable future.

Frederik Andersen hasn’t been on the ice since last Friday night, when he allowed four goals on 18 shots in a loss against Calgary.

A lower-body injury has sidelined Andersen.

“He has had some different examinations and different things he has had looked at,” Keefe said. “His return is not imminent. I expect we’ll have an update in the coming days.

“I didn’t find (Campbell) was as sharp tonight. But these kinds of things happen as you start to play more games.
“We don’t like that we gave them a point but love how we fought our way back and got the win for Soupy.”

tkoshan@postmedia.com

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