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Auston Matthews was part of an overly animated timeout during the third period of the Toronto Maple Leafs' 6-2 win. After seeing their lead shrink to 5-2, Leafs head coach Craig Berube called timeout and implored his team to get back to the basics. They appeared to shape up after that even if they still held a commanding lead.
The Maple Leafs captain was asked about the timeout in the postgame press conference. He said:
"Just getting our game back, taking care of the puck, being harder in our zone. There were times in the game, early in the second and third periods, where the momentum shifted, and we needed to grab it back. That was the messaging in the timeout."
The Maple Leafs responded with another goal and beat the Los Angeles Kings. It continued a brilliant stretch of play to start the year and has them firmly atop the Atlantic Division at 3-1-0.
The Leafs were able to almost cruise to victory because of three opening-period goals. Matthews said a "good start" was what propelled them to another win:
"Solid throughout. Slowly made some big saves. I thought we defended pretty well and had contributions from all four lines. When you're able to roll four lines throughout the game, it can make it pretty hard on the opposition."
The Maple Leafs are back in action Saturday against the New York Rangers.
Auston Matthews opens up on Maple Leafs power play success
For much of the year, the Toronto Maple Leafs haven't had as much success on power plays as they'd like. That finally seemed to turn around against the Kings. Auston Matthews seemed relieved as he said after the game:
"Yeah, it's always good to get that going. Obviously, it wasn’t great the first couple of games, just trying to find it a little bit. Anytime you see the puck go in on the power play a couple of times, you can take that momentum and just continue to build off of it."
So far, almost everything has gone well for the Leafs. They're 3-1-0 and look like a much better team than the one that fizzled out in the postseason last year.
