Toronto Maple Leafs centre Patrick Marleau is stopped by Boston Bruins goaltender Tuukka Rask during the first period of Game 4 in Toronto, on April 19, 2018.Nathan Denette/The Canadian Press
With the surprise announcement just before the game that Patrice Bergeron, the Boston Bruins’ best player, was out due to injury, the Toronto Maple Leafs were handed a great opportunity – and then let it slip away.
With the Bruins still holding a 2-1 lead in the first-round NHL playoff series, even the Leafs admitted the team that won Thursday’s game would probably win the series. “It’s very crucial. We want to make sure we take care of business [Thursday]. They won their two at home, we need to do our job and win our two and make it a best-of-three,” Leafs star Auston Matthews said.
By the end of the night, all the Leafs could say is they outplayed the Bruins for most of the game. But it was the Bruins who pounced when mistakes were made, taking a 3-1 win and a series lead back to Boston by the same margin.
At this point, with the way the Bruins have their defensive game nailed down, even if Bergeron can’t play for the rest of the series they have the Leafs in a hammer-lock.
“When Bergeron didn’t play tonight, you’re set up pretty good,” Maple Leafs head coach Mike Babcock said. “You’ve got to find a way to win. This is in our building, you’ve got to win.”
The Leafs came close a few times, they controlled the play for most of the night, but they could never get loose enough to turn all that possession into good scoring chances. Bruins goaltender Tuukka Rask was solid – he made the saves on the Leafs’ two best chances, a breakaway and a two-on-one – but he was never forced to make great saves among the 32 shots he faced.
Torey Krug stunned the Leafs with a first-minute goal and the hosts fought hard after Tomas Plekanec tied the score. But the Bruins capitalized on Leafs mistakes late in the second period and early in the third with goals from Brad Marchand and Jake DeBrusk.
“I didn’t think we had everyone going,” Babcock said. “They scored the first shift; I thought we took over and had the game well in control. Even when we were down 2-1, I thought we were in a great spot because we had the puck a lot.
“In the end we made the two plays, we had a breakaway and the two-on-one and got nothing out of it. Both their two-on-ones, one on a pinch and one where we hit the guy on the kneepad, they buried and we didn’t make good plays on them to help our goalie out. In the end that’s the game.”
For the third time in four games in this series, Matthews and linemate William Nylander were not a factor. With Matthews scoring the winning goal in Game 3 there were hopes he would take charge Thursday night.
“I think the great thing about playoff time and being a young guy is you get lots of lessons,” Babcock said. “No one is more aware than [Matthews] is right now.
“I am assuming he thought he was going to come tonight and dominate the game. That’s what I thought. I thought the same of Willie [Nylander]. It didn’t happen. But the other people you’re playing against are pros and they’re trying too. They’re competitive.”
The buzz started shortly before the game when the Bruins announced their starting lineup would not include Bergeron. This came as a shock even though he missed part of Wednesday’s practice, with Riley Nash moving up from the third line to play between Marchand and David Pastrnak.
There was no indication in the last two days from the Bruins anything was amiss with Bergeron. But this is not unusual in a league where lying about injuries is winked at. Bergeron himself played into the mystery when he was asked about knocking off early on Wednesday. He implied it was head coach Bruce Cassidy’s idea.
“It’s great,” Bergeron said after Thursday’s game-day skate. “Definitely something that it’s up to [Cassidy] to manage.”
By the end of the first period, with the Bruins calling Bergeron’s malady an “upper-body injury” and listing his status as day-to-day, the media sleuths concluded there were two possibilities. One was an open-ice hit Bergeron took on his chest during Game 3 from Plekanec, who surprised everyone with his defensive work on the Bruins centre. The other was illness, as some thought Bergeron sounded a little under the weather at Thursday’s skate.
The 19,689 onlookers at the Air Canada had barely digested the news about Bergeron and settled in their seats when the Leafs handed the Bruins a huge morale-booster.
A soft wrist shot by Bruins defenceman Krug from near the blue line sailed into the top corner of the Leafs net 28 seconds after the opening faceoff. Leafs goaltender Frederik Andersen could say he was partially screened by Plekanec and Nash, who skated in front of him as the shot floated in, but that is supposed to be a routine save for NHL goaltenders.
“I saw it initially, but on the way in I lost it,” Andersen said of the shot. “It’s one I’ve got to fight to see.”
The Leafs, though, shook off the body shot and started skating. For the second game in a row, the Leafs line of Plekanec, Mitch Marner and Patrick Marleau gave the Bruins fits. They were all skating hard and keeping the puck in the Bruins zone on every shift.
Then Plekanec picked a great time to score his first goal as a Maple Leaf. Once again that line got the puck into the Bruins zone and then Marleau spotted Plekanec alone in the slot. Plekanec scored at 7:43 to tie the score and send a wave of relief through the building.
For the next 30 minutes the Leafs had the puck on a string but could not get a lot of clean chances on Rask. Their best chance came on another one of those stretch passes between Rielly and Marner. This one sent Marner on a breakaway but Rask made the stop on his shot.
“I thought we did some good things,” Leafs forward James van Riemsdyk said. “There wasn’t a lot of room or a lot of chances to be had out there. It was a pretty tight game.
“As far as getting pucks on net there weren’t too many scoring chances. That’s the kind of game you have to expect in the playoffs and they executed a little better than we did.”
Just as people were thinking the loss of Bergeron actually cost the Bruins the effectiveness of Marchand as well, the Leafs made one of those mistakes they tend to make and paid for it.
Bruins defenceman Adam McQuaid fired the puck up the right boards and it skipped past Leafs defenceman Jake Gardiner, who also let Pastrnak get past him.
Pastrnak and Marchand flew down the ice on a two-on-one with Pastrnak carrying the puck. He fooled Andersen into thinking he would shoot and then sent a last-second feed to Marchand. Andersen was over-committed to Pastrnak, as was defenceman Nikita Zaitsev and Marchand roofed a shot into the open net at 16:55 for a 2-1 Boston lead.
The rush of air out of the building was almost audible. Silence set in a little later when the Leafs coughed up another two-on-one with DeBrusk finishing it off at 4:17 of the third period.
While the Leafs will get centre Nazem Kadri back from his three-game suspension for Game 5 on Saturday, they face an enormous challenge to get back in the series.
“It’s going to be nice. [Kadri] brings a lot of skill,” Marner said. “He’s going to be eager to get back in. Just got to make sure we’re doing the right things, making sure we’re above people, and making sure we’re getting pucks to the net.”