The four-game winning streak came to an end as the Toronto Maple Leafs dropped their matchup against the reigning Stanley Cup Champion Florida Panthers 5-1. The two teams skated into this one on two opposite ends of the urgency bar. The Leafs were riding on a wave of positive play and strong structure while Panthers coach Paul Maurice bag-skated his players to spark the team off some tough losses.
The difference in said urgency was clear from the start, and the Leafs paid for it after going down 2-0 in 50 seconds. Nikita Grebenkin’s hit on Uvis Balinskis earned him a boarding call, which the Panthers turned into an Aleksander Barkov power-play goal. They kept coming the next shift, and Mackie Samoskevich doubled the lead.
The middle frame wasn’t anything spectacular for Toronto as it struggled to sustain time in the Panthers’ end. Sam Reinhart’s short-handed goal could’ve been the dagger, but Mitch Marner kept the team alive with a power-play goal to make it 3-1. Despite finishing the game dead even in shots, the Panthers held the Leafs back from generating anything significant at five-on-five in the third period. Ultimately, special teams decided the game: The Leafs scored on one of their three opportunities, while the Panthers scored on two of their five and got production from their penalty kill.
The lineup is depleted, and the injury bug took another victim via Bobby McMann, but the team’s lack of jump is something we haven’t seen in some time. They get a C- for this one.
Player reports
Nikita Grebenkin: B+
Grebenkin’s physicality and aggressiveness will keep him in the lineup. He was called on his first hit of the game, but his quickness along the boards and with the puck is a great mix. Grebenkin got a look on the top power play in the second, and his work off the draw didn’t result in a point, though it helped get the puck to Marner off Aaron Ekblad’s stick.
Fraser Minten: B+
Minten turned it up after being on the ice for the second goal against. He showed good poise and timing with the puck to maintain possession in the offensive zone, which was huge, and his shot off the post nearly put the Leafs on the board. Minten doesn’t look out of place at all.
the kid shift pic.twitter.com/RpEstNP161
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 28, 2024
Chris Tanev: B+
He had five blocks on the night and his reads on the penalty kill to get clears were great as well.
Mitch Marner: B
The patience on the power-play goal was a thing of beauty. Marner had Sergei Bobrovsky down and buried it high to extend his point streak. His lines struggled to generate offense at five-on-five overall.
Mitch Marner’s goal is now unassisted pic.twitter.com/5yRFnbo5Mb
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 28, 2024
Jake McCabe: B
McCabe had some fearless blocks out there.
Anthony Stolarz: B-
Stolarz came up big for the Leafs after it was 2-0. He was later reading the cross-ice pass to Barkov on the first and although he was deep in his net on the second, he had Oliver Ekman-Larsson right in front of him. The Carter Verhaeghe goal gave me pause. Stolarz rarely gets beat high given his frame and it seemed as if he went down early, leaving space short side for Verhaeghe to score on.
Carter Verhaeghe makes it 4-1 pic.twitter.com/dummebFvSn
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 28, 2024
Simon Benoit: B-
Making and connecting on some stretch passes, but the turnovers and pinch ahead of the rush against that led to Conor Timmins’ penalty standout. On a positive note, he got a good block (finishing the game with four) and was clear on the penalty kill in the third.
John Tavares: C+
That was a cursed yet slightly beneficial power-play shift. Things started well for Tavares as his drive to the front of the net drew a hooking call, still getting a shot on Bobrovsky despite fully sitting down. Reinhart’s goal came off his stick as his board pass to William Nylander was picked up.
Sam Reinhart scores shorthanded pic.twitter.com/VC2Cdg0YFX
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 28, 2024
Tavares found himself in no-man’s land taking Ekblad on the rush against leaving Reinhart with little to deter him from scoring. He then got high-sticked off the draw but still kept himself in the play and won the next faceoff, getting the secondary assist on Marner’s goal.
Connor Dewar: C+
He had a run on the top line with Tavares and Marner when McMann went down. His one and only shot squeaked through Bobrovsky but stayed out of the net.
Morgan Rielly: C
Rielly was responsible for almost half of the team’s shot production in the first, and while it’s an “old” stat, a minus-3 isn’t great.
Oliver Ekman-Larsson: C
It was a loose start for Ekman-Larsson. He turned the puck over on the power play in the Leafs’ end and screened Stolarz on the second goal against.
Conor Timmins: C
Getting shots on net from the point but he racked up two penalties.
Alex Nylander: C
Nylander got some time on the first unit to start and had some board battles on the third line with Minten and with his brother in the third. Aside from his two shots, however, he didn’t stand out much.
Alex Steeves and Steven Lorentz: C
Both players had a single hit. Steeves had a good survival shift in the first as he was caught out late.
William Nylander: C-
There were a few well-timed steals and slot passes on the power play, but Nylander didn’t start getting shots until the third. He also got a double-minor for cross-checking Nate Schmidt which the Panthers converted on and finished the game a minus-3.
Nick Robertson: D
It looked as if Robertson needed to do more to control the puck offensively and more defensively. He’s moving out there, but didn’t win key races to pucks in the D-zone instead taking himself out of position for scoring chances.
Pontus Holmberg:
A game like this shows Holmberg’s limitations as a second-line centre. He had zeros across the board and finished at 36.4 percent in the dot.
Bobby McMann: N/A
Another injury occurred on the team, with McMann leaving in the second after playing 10:21. The team deemed it a lower-body injury.
rough night for McMann
could be a combination of things, he also fell during his last shift of the game off a defensive zone draw pic.twitter.com/OhnbrrSZNQ
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 28, 2024
Game Score
What’s next for the Leafs?
The Leafs complete the Florida trip by taking on the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday at 7:00 p.m. ET.
(Photo: Sam Navarro / Imagn Images)
