Toronto Maple Leafs' Mitchell Marner celebrates after scoring against the Los Angeles Kings in Toronto on Dec. 8.Chris Young/The Canadian Press
Mitch Marner extended his franchise record for points to 21 consecutive games and the Maple Leafs registered a point in their 13th game in a row on Thursday during a 5-0 rout of the Kings at Scotiabank Arena.
Toronto blew the game open with three goals in a span of 1 minute 6 seconds in the second period in its 10th victory in its last 13. Pierre Engvall and David Kampf got the first two, each their fourth of the season, and William Nylander followed that up with a nifty backhander, his team-leading 15th. Then Marner scored unassisted, his 11th goal of the campaign.
Marner is only the fourth active player in the NHL to record a point streak of at least 20 games. The others are Chicago’s Patrick Kane (twice), Pittsburgh’s Sidney Crosby and Colorado’s Paul Stastny.
This is how special it is: Half of the teams in the NHL have never had a single player register a point in 20 straight games.
“I’m not trying to focus on it too much,” Marner, who has 33 points in 28 games, said. “It changes real quick how people think about you.”
The Maple Leafs improved to 17-5-6 and play again at home on Saturday against the Calgary Flames. Los Angeles dropped to 14-11-4. It was the Kings’ first loss in regulation time in eight outings against teams from the Atlantic Division.
Auston Matthews carries the puck past Kings forward Kevin Fiala.John E. Sokolowski/USA TODAY Sports via Reuters
The win avenged Toronto’s 4-2 loss in Los Angeles on Oct. 29.
Nicholas Robertson, the promising 21-year-old winger, was lost to a shoulder injury midway through the first period. Robertson was interfered with in the Kings offensive zone by defenceman Matt Roy and went down hard to the ice. He remained prone for a long while before he was helped off while favouring his right arm.
“It’s a tough break for him,” Toronto coach Sheldon Keefe said. Robertson was getting more playing time with Calle Jarnkrok out injured. “I feel for the kid. He gives everything he has to the team.”
Keefe said Robertson “will miss significant time.”
A boisterous crowd that included Justin Bieber and his wife, Hailey, enjoyed a brief fight between Zach Aston-Reese of the Maple Leafs and the Kings’ Blake Lizotte. Each was penalized for five minutes but Lizotte got an extra penalty for slashing, which led to the game’s first goal. A minute into the third period, Engvall was kicked out after he struck Sean Durzi in the back of his head with his stick. The referee called it “an intent to injure.” The two had tangled a few seconds earlier.
Durzi waved to Engvall as he headed down the tunnel with his game misconduct.
“It was more just a situation of two guys battling,” Keefe said.
Marner is only the fourth active player in the NHL to record a point streak of at least 20 games.Claus Andersen/Getty Images
The second-period outburst was not completely unexpected in as much as Los Angeles’s goalies came in with an .833 save percentage, the worst in the league. Toronto’s Matt Murray, Ilya Samsonov and Erik Kallgren entered the evening with a combined .919 save percentage, third best in the NHL.
Samsonov got the start and made 29 saves as he improved to 8-2 overall as Toronto recorded back-to-back shutouts. Murray made 44 saves in a 4-0 win over Dallas on Tuesday.
“We played great in the defensive zone and the offensive zone,” Samsonov said. “We dominated today. It was a great job.”
Jonathan Quick, who stopped 36 shots, played well early but eventually succumbed under the Leafs’ deluge. He is 8-8-2.
Toronto dominated in the offensive zone in the first period and at one point, had a 14-4 advantage in shots on goal. It failed to score on two power-play opportunities, one drawn by Robertson that resulted in the injury and another by Pontus Holmberg.
Mark Giordano got called for a high stick late in the first but the teams went to their dressing rooms 0-0. Quick turned away all 14 shots he faced over the first 20 minutes. He ended up with 36 saves.
The dam burst in the second as the goals piled up. Alexander Kerfoot assisted on two of them, and Conor Timmins, Holmberg and Justin Holl and Michael Bunting had one each. Bunting, who also assisted on a third-period goal by Auston Matthews, has assists in seven consecutive games.
T.J. Brodie returned to Toronto’s lineup for the first time since he suffered an oblique injury on Nov. 11.
“I felt good the last couple of days,” Brodie, 32, said. “The mental part of coming back is the hardest. It is hard to replicate that mindset without playing games.”
Brodie was paired with Timmins, the newcomer acquired from Arizona. The timing for his return could not have been better – Victor Mete joined fellow blueliners Morgan Rielly, Jake Muzzin and Jordie Benn on the injured list earlier this week.
“He is a guy you don’t replace,” said Giordano, a long-time partner of Brodie’s on defence when both were in Calgary. “He is going to take a lot of minutes out there. It’s going to be big for our team.”
The Maple Leafs entered the match on a 12-game point streak (9-0-3), the second-longest in franchise history. The record is 16 set during 2003-04.
In a number of ways, the game might have been Toronto’s most complete of the season.
“It’s up there for sure,” Marner said. “In that second period, we took over. We played with speed, we played with pace. It was just an all-around great effort by everybody.”
Said Keefe: “There is a long list of things that stood out. So much was happening today. It’s a little hard to process.”
Marty Klinkenberg