It’s a new year and both the Toronto Maple Leafs and the New York Islanders were looking to start on the right foot. On New Year’s Eve, the Maple Leafs beat the Islanders 3–1 to even the season series 1–1. That was without captain and superstar Auston Matthews. Last night was the rubber match.
It sounds like the Maple Leafs will be without Auston Matthews for a bit longer. Despite joining the team at practice earlier this week, he admitted that he is not sure he can get over his injury, whatever it is, this season. Fortunately, the Maple Leafs saw the return of Oliver Ekman-Larsson to the lineup.
Let’s take a look at the main storylines coming out of the 2–1 Maple Leafs win against the Islanders.
New year, Woll still standing
Besides Bobby McMann, which we will get to in a bit, Joseph Woll was the Maple Leafs’ best player last night. Woll looked like he was still stuck in 2024 because he posted a .970 save percentage, stopped 32 of 33 shots, and won the Maple Leafs the game.
From the first period where Woll had to stop odd-man rushes and a breakaway due to sloppy defensive coverage, to making four big saves on the Islanders’ first power play of the game in the second period, to bailing out his team from several horrible giveaways a few feet in front of his net all game, to even recovering from being taken out of the play by his own defender in the third, Woll kept his team in the game.
There were concerns with Anthony Stolarz being out for four to six weeks Woll could not handle the increased workload. Given Woll’s prior injury history, this was a valid concern. So far, touch wood, Woll has been up to the task and playing well.
Secondary Scoring: The Bobby McMann Show
Since I posted the article about the Maple Leafs needing secondary scoring this year, I am glad the bottom six have internalized that post and continued to make me look foolish.
All jokes aside, the bottom six has been unstoppable in recent games, and the leader has been McMann. McMann scored the two goals in last night’s game, with one of them on the power play. In his last 10 games, McMann has six goals and four assists for 10 points.
McMann’s linemates, Max Domi and Nicholas Robertson, each picked up an assist in tonight’s game as the third-line continues to be a dominant force on the ice.
The fourth line also played another strong game tonight, with Steven Lorentz hitting the crossbar in the first period. The line generally played in the Islander’s zone all night, with Connor Dewar and Lorentz showing great chemistry together.
The Maple Leafs’ defence needs to generate offence
We will do an in-depth dive into the lack of offence from the Maple Leafs’ defence this year, but if you told me that the Maple Leafs’ defence would not score a goal in the month of December, I would probably have laughed at you.
Yet, this is what happened. The Maple Leafs’ defencemen have a pass-first mentality, and it shows especially on the power play.
Yes, Ekman-Larsson had a power play assist on the game-winning goal. But Rielly, who is on the first power play, only has one goal and six assists on the man advantage. Ekman-Larsson had zero power play points coming into yesterday’s game. Granted, outside of a brief stint on the first power play unit earlier in the season, he generally plays on the second unit which sees much less ice-time.
Part of the Maple Leafs’ struggles on the power play is that the defencemen rarely shoot the puck, and when they do, the shots do not make it to the net. The Maple Leafs need to find a way to allow shots to get through to the net from the point so that players in front can score off the rebound or deflect the puck.
Onto the next game
The Maple Leafs won their first game of 2025. However, they need to return to the form that we saw earlier in the season if they want to be successful. The Maple Leafs cannot rely on goaltending to bail them out each game. Furthermore, too many giveaways in the defensive zone will catch up with them and will start to cost them games.
Luckily, the Leafs don’t play the Islanders again this season. The boring hockey is over, and even though Toronto didn’t look great in the three games against New York, they won the season series 2–1. Revenge for booing Tavares, I guess.
