*Photo from the San Diego Union Tribune*
Toronto wins series 4-2
After all these years, the monkey is finally off the back. Auston Matthews scored, John Tavares scored the winning goal, and the Toronto Maple Leafs defeated the Tampa Bay Lightning 2-1 in overtime on Saturday night in Tampa Bay.
The Maple Leafs went a perfect 3-0 on the road this series, and it allowed them to win the series against the Lightning, who went to the Stanley Cup Finals for 3 years in a row and won two. It's the first playoff series win for the Maple Leafs since 2004.
Maple Leafs head coach Sheldon Keefe said that "It's been a long time coming, a long time coming for a lot of players in our room, long time coming for myself, long time coming for Leafs Nation. It's a big deal. You see that puck find its way in the net and it's just an incredible moment. Playoff hockey is incredible. This whole night was incredible."
Starting the scoring in this one was Matthews. He scored 13:47 into the game to give the Maple Leafs a 1-0 lead, assisted by TJ Brodie on his 5th goal of the series. It would remain 1-0 until the 3rd period, when Steven Stamkos scored, getting the Lightning on the board and making it a 1-1 game, assisted by Anthony Cirelli and Darren Raddysh.
It remained 1-1 through regulation, forcing overtime in Tampa Bay. Tavares played as the hero for the Maple Leafs, scoring the series winning goal 4:36 into overtime to send the Maple Leafs to the second round, assisted by Morgan Rielly and Matthew Knies on his 4th goal of the series and his most important one.
Tavares said of his goal that "I got the puck up high and interchanged with Marner, and I thought most of the coverage would go to him. But they read it well and I just kept the puck in. With the space that I had and knowing Rielly went to the net, I said let's throw it there and see what happens."
Starting in net for the Maple Leafs was Ilya Samsonov, who had a tremendous game as the Maple Leafs won the series. Samsonov stopped all but one of the 32 shots he saw from the Lightning, giving him a .969 save percentage on the night.
It was Andrei Vasilevskiy in goal for the Lightning as they saw their season end after just one round, having not lost a series since 2019. Vasilevskiy made 20 saves out of the 22 shots on goal the Maple Leafs had, posting a .909 save percentage.
Stamkos said after the game that "There's no shame in the effort that we put in, maybe the execution at times wasn't great. No one should go home feeling like we didn't leave it on the ice. I thought we played better 5-on-5 hockey than we did last year. Maybe we got some bounces last year. That's a good hockey team over there. It stinks when it doesn't go your way."
Up next, the Maple Leafs await the winner of the series between the Boston Bruins and the Florida Panthers in the second round. The Lightning will have an earlier start to the offseason as they look ahead to next season.
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