Toronto Maple Leafs defence comes up big in romp over Ottawa Senators – Toronto Sun

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Justin Holl was definitely ready for his close-up.

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But with two bloodied nose plugs up his schnozz, he was able to get the rusty Maple Leafs on the board and himself on the big screen on a huge night for Toronto’s entire defence in its return to play Saturday.

While Holl said team timing would be off after nearly three weeks, it didn’t mean himself or TJ Brodie, the latter with two assists on a pair of short-handed goals 27 seconds apart and a goal to boot .

While Auston Matthews, John Tavares, Mitch Marner and William Nylander eventually got rolling against the undermanned Ottawa Senators, it was the blue line crew that started 2022 on the right note with two goals and six points, sparking a 6-0 win. But Matthews, who owns the Sens with 39 points in 24 games against them before Saturday, saw his 10-game points streak end, though Ilya Mikheyev added third-period insurance, with his second goal.

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Jack Campbell had the 23-save shutout, his fourth this year, but was happiest for the defence.

“They were amazing, holding them to that many shots, getting sticks on rebounds and boxing out,” Campbell said. “Then Hollsie, it’s great to see him score. And with nose plugs (from being clipped by Rasmus Sandin’s skate) that was awesome. The boys got a big kick out of seeing that one.”

The Leafs’ first game since Dec. 14 was played with a near full lineup after the NHL’s latest COVID-19 crisis, but in a near empty Scotiabank Arena, reverting to early 2021’s strict local health restrictions. While COVID had pushed many Canadian dates back for all northern teams because of lowered crowds and revenue, it was agreed by all parties not to let this Saturday night window for rights holder Sportsnet to pass and to get the two antsy teams back to work.

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Holl’s first of the season triggered the fastest two shorties in a game since 1986 in a team record-tying 27 seconds. It began after the over-zealous Toronto power play had let two early chances slip off their sticks and Morgan Rielly had gone off for crosschecking.

Brodie started the Holl goal, a great sliding defensive play to send David Kampf away with Brodie’s defence partner. The Leafs had just celebrated that when Brodie helped set up a Mikheyev breakaway.

“Soup came up with some big saves, but the forwards did a good job coming back,” Brodie said. “That forced them to get rid of the puck and allowed us to get it moving the other way.”

It had been almost nine years since Toronto had two short-handed the same night, while Holl and Mikheyev equalled the 27 ticks between Borje Salming and Greg Terrion’s goals in November of ’86 at Chicago Stadium.

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Brodie, whose two short-handed assists were also the first by a Leafs’ defenceman since Larry Hillman in a 1966 game, made it 3-0 in the second period on a wraparound in which Rielly assisted.

As for the big guns, they came up empty during their first five power plays before Mikheyev’s second of the night, preceded by Nylander’s 14th. The game also marked the return of Marner from a shoulder injury nearly a month before, forward Jason Spezza, suspended four games and then downed with COVID and Sandin, who had a leg injury and then tested positive.

“It was a funny game for so many reasons,” head coach Sheldon Keefe said. “First game in many weeks, no fans and then right out of gate, two powers plays. From my perspective that was a worst-case scenario.”

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The Leafs had returned to practice on Boxing Day, after which a number of their double-digit protocol cases slowly returned. Only defenceman Timothy Liljegren remains sidelined, but recently cleared Jake Muzzin was kept out late Saturday morning. Taxi Squader Alex Biega made his Leafs debut.

Nylander, also just released from protocol when the isolation time was cut to five days, was able to play and get two goals, while Nick Ritchie was a healthy scratch.

It wasn’t a world-beater lineup they faced, as Ottawa came off its 13-day break, in which it canceled six games, with a slew of injuries and COVID cases. They were missing No. 1 centre Josh Norris, Colin White, Josh Brown, Shane Pinto, ex-Leaf Tyler Ennis, Nick Paul and Dillon Heatherington.

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Toronto hadn’t been back at Scotiabank since beating Chicago on Dec. 11. with eight of its games scrubbed among 80 across the NHL. During their hiatus, the Leafs fell behind Tampa Bay and Florida in the Atlantic Division.

“In a lot of ways, it’s a reset for everybody, whether you were going good before the break or not,” said Holl. “We’ll have to go out and prove ourselves all over again.”

While canned crowd noise and the usual game night time out music continued, there was blue tarp across the empty seats behind the team benches.

Team captain Tavares, also plagued by COVID for a spell, played in his 900th NHL game.

“Whatever the circumstances, we’re just happy to get back to competing,” he said “This is what you work hard for.

“Obviously it sucks (not having fans), we want to be playing in front of our fans and have a full building in our own house. But circumstances have changed and we just hope things (with COVID) improve quickly.”