Ducks blow two-goal lead, lose Gauthier in OT loss to Maple Leafs
· Yahoo Sports
ANAHEIM, Calif. – It looked like there were two points in the bag. The Anaheim Ducks had handled the circus of the Radko Gudas retaliation game by the visiting Toronto Maple Leafs and led by two goals into the third period.
Then it slipped away.
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A sloppy final 20 minutes allowed the Leafs to rush back and grab a 4-3 lead, and despite Leo Carlsson coming back from injury to score another miraculous game-tying goal, Toronto pounced on a tired Ducks shift in overtime for the winner, 5-4, on Monday at Honda Center.
Carlsson scored two goals, John Carlson scored his first as a Duck and Cutter Gauthier scored his team-leading 38th goal of the season. Ville Husso made 23 saves to help earn a point and grow the Ducks’ Pacific Division lead to four points with eight games to play.
“What I think is we should have had two points in the game and been moving on to tomorrow,” John Carlson said, “but I think we did a good job for a lot of the game in terms of how we played in terms of dealing with the emotions and dealing with what it was. But we got to be more mature and come out on top of these games when we're coming down the stretch. We're running out of real estate to both collect as many points as we can and also feel good about how we're playing.”
Gauthier left the game after scoring in the first period. He has an upper-body injury and will be further evaluated tomorrow.
This was the Ducks’ first loss when leading after two periods. Anaheim is now 23-0-1 in that scenario.
“I would be not happy at all,” Ducks coach Joel Quenneville said on what his group’s No.1 takeaway should be.
The Ducks (41-28-5, 87 points) remain in first place in the Pacific Division, and now by four points over Edmonton (37-28-9, 83 points). Third-place Vegas (33-26-16, 82 points) won tonight to pull within a point of the Oilers.
Anaheim is even in games played with Edmonton and holds one game in hand on the Knights.
The Ducks pop back out for another crucial divisional road game in San Jose on Wednesday. It will be a national broadcast on TNT.
Injury Scares to Gauthier, Carlsson
Far beyond whatever the scoreboard results were and the outside noise entering the game, the most crucial thing for the Ducks was the health of their top two scorers: Cutter Gauthier and Leo Carlsson.
Gauthier left the game after scoring on the power play to put the Ducks up two goals in the first period. His 38th goal of the season is the most by a Ducks player since Corey Perry’s 43 in 2017-18.
Gauthier was seemingly injured before releasing the shot that beat Anthony Stolarz five hole. Gauthier took a standard cross check along the boards early in the play.
Anaheim’s leading goal scorer was diagnosed with an upper-body injury.
“We'll see how he is tomorrow, and we get a better read on it,” Quenneville said.
Leo Carlsson scored the opening goal, the first opening goal scored by the Ducks in seven games and just the third in 18 games since the Olympic break. It was Carlsson’s first goal in six games.
Carlsson then twisted his leg early in the third period in a collision between Troy Terry and the Leafs’ William Nylander. Carlsson was helped to the bench and the locker room.
He returned 10 minutes later and scored the Ducks’ ninth game-tying goal in the final two minutes this season–a new NHL record.
“Just got a little twisted there, but it’s all good,” Carlsson said.
Anaheim has been up-and-down with the injury bug over the last week.
Radko Gudas and Pavel Mintyukov missed Saturday’s game in Edmonton with lower-body injuries, but both defensemen returned to play against Toronto.
Terry was held out Thursday in Calgary for maintenance of a lower-body injury, and he also did not skate in Tuesday’s morning skate. However, the 28-year-old did play in Edmonton on Saturday and tonight against Toronto.
Jansen Harkins took an upper-body injury last week in Vancouver and is week-to-week. Ross Johnston is still labelled as week-to-week with a lower-body injury.
Third Period Swoon
As it was Saturday in Edmonton, the details of the game come into greater focus as the season winds down and how to win in the playoffs becomes more front of mind.
That manifested on Monday, as the division-leading Ducks were unable to hold onto a two-goal lead against a Maple Leafs team well out of the playoff race and on the verge of mathematical elimination.
There were the extra circumstances of Toronto facing Radko Gudas for the first time since Gudas earned a five-game suspension for a kneeing incident against Maple Leafs captain Auston Matthews, who is out for the rest of the season following an MCL tear on that hit.
There was plenty of emotion to be had and a circus of fights and penalties, but through that, Anaheim did what it needed to do to lead, 3-1. However, that hold on the game slipped away quickly.
“I think over the course of the season you learn mental toughness and situational play,” Quenneville said. “Do everything you can to lead to a win. And we got a lesson again today.”
Matthew Knies scored on a power play seven minutes into the period, and three minutes later, Beckett Sennecke turned the puck over high in the Ducks’ offensive zone. William Nylander was off to the races for the game-tying goal, 3-3.
This was the third time in the last seven games that an offensive turnover by the Ducks 20-year-old rookie led to a key rush goal by the opposition.
“Every day is a new day,” Quenneville said, “and every day, we learn, and every day, we address, and we give him some freedom to do a lot of things. Offensively, you don’t want to take away from him, but that's sometimes where the trouble starts, so I think we gotta find that balance.”
With three minutes left in the game, Toronto again scored on the rush, this time as defenseman Morgan Reilly beat the trailing Ducks forwards up the ice to step into space for the go-ahead strike.
“We had a good forecheck the whole night,” John Carlson said. “We got the puck back a lot on plays, tip plays behind their goal line and creating turnovers and turning it into offense. And we just kind of went away from that a little bit, maybe not went away from it, but didn't do it enough at times. All of a sudden you give those, those guys with some high-end talent, rushes and three-on-twos and looks that can't happen.”
Leo Carlsson eventually would salvage a Ducks point with his game-tying goal, but that was far less than Anaheim should have taken out of Monday’s game.
“Every game that we play we think that there's adjustments that you want to make,” Quenneville said, “and there's things that you gotta make an awareness that preventing things like that that can happen. Those are the simplest things to eliminate out of your game. And they'll be addressed.”
Retaliation on Radko
The top outside storyline entering Monday was Radko Gudas and the Maple Leafs’ first opportunity to get retribution for the loss of their captain Auston Matthews.
The Ducks captain returned from a five-game suspension last week, and despite missing Anaheim’s last game with a lower-body injury, Gudas was determined to stand up and take his lumps against Toronto.
“Stand behind my own mistakes. I want to address it myself,” Gudas told the assembled horde of media at the morning skate. “That's one of the reasons, 100%. One of those games where I have to play.”
Gudas wanted to protect his own teammates. If Gudas was not out there for Toronto to take its pound of flesh, it’s possible the Leafs could have turned their aggression towards any of the Ducks young stars instead.
“I think it's going to be an intense game,” Gudas said. “One of the reasons why I want to play. Address things.”
Gudas expected things to be taken care of early, and while the festivities started right away, they were hardly taken care of.
Off the opening face-off, Max Domi squared up with Gudas directly at center ice, and Gudas did not throw a single punch in the altercation, seemingly taking his punishment with aplomb.
Despite the league keeping an eye on things, the referees quick to legislate things and even former Duck and Department of Player Safety head man George Parros in attendance, that’s not where things ended.
“They don't want the game to get out of hand, and I don't blame them,” Toronto coach Craig Berube said this morning. “I don't think it's good for anybody. You don't want anything stupid happening, suspensions, and things like that. That doesn't solve anything. Just go out and play the game with a lot of emotion, energy, be physical, and be hard on their skill players.”
There were dust-ups and roughing calls throughout the first period, and in the second period, Gudas continued to be targeted.
Michael Pezzetta finished a check on Gudas in the corner and kept going at the Ducks captain while he was still on the ice. Even after being separated, Pezzetta still tried to get a Gudas, and earned a 10-minute misconduct and game misconduct for abuse of officials for his trouble.
Later in the period, Gudas was jumped by Jake McCabe after a play was blown dead around the net. Gudas and McCabe both received 10-minute misconducts.
All in all, the teams combined for 22 penalties and 85 penalty minutes–13 calls for 61 minutes against Toronto and nine penalties for 24 minutes against Anaheim.
Playoff Magic Numbers
At (41-28-5) 87 points, the Ducks’ magic number (combined number of points won by Anaheim and lost by the first team out of a playoff spot) to clinch its first playoff berth since 2018 is nine.
Los Angeles (29-26-18, 76 points), Seattle (32-29-11, 75 points) and San Jose (34-31-7, 75 points) are those first teams out. If the Kings won their remaining games, they would get to 94 points. If the Kraken and Sharks won their remaining slate, they would reach 95 points, but Seattle has the regulation wins tiebreaker on Anaheim.
Anaheim’s magic number to clinch the Pacific Division title is 13, with Edmonton capable of hitting 99 points and holding the regulation wins tiebreaker.