Charlie McAvoy did not travel to Toronto due to a family matter. Nor did Casey Mittelstadt, who suffered a lower-body injury on Thursday. Nor did Johnny Beecher, who suffered an upper-body injury in that game. Given how well McAvoy and Mittelstadt in particular had been playing recently, the built-in excuses were there if the Bruins’ winning streak came to an end Saturday night.
Boston didn’t take those excuses, though, and the winning streak didn’t end. Instead, the Bruins turned in arguably their most impressive, gutsiest effort of the season thus far and beat the Maple Leafs, 5-3, for their sixth straight victory.
This was truly a full-team effort, and a testament to the Bruins’ depth. Members of all four lines scored. The defense stepped up with its leader out. Jeremy Swayman was very good in net, stopping 30 of the 33 shots he faced.
There was perhaps no better symbol of how well it’s all clicking for Marco Sturm’s squad right now than the way Mason Lohrei played in his return to the lineup after getting healthy-scratched for the previous five games.
Simply put, Lohrei was great Saturday. He was arguably the best player on the ice. Just 18 seconds after Toronto took a 1-0 lead, Lohrei set up Morgan Geekie for the Bruins’ first goal. He added a second assist on a Mikey Eyssimont power-play goal early in the second period that gave Boston a 3-2 lead. He meshed well with Jonathan Aspirot, the man who had taken Lohrei’s job of late. In that pair’s 12:07 of 5-on-5 ice time, the Bruins outshot the Leafs 7-2 and outscored them 2-0.
Just 20 seconds after Geekie’s goal, it was the second line that gave the Bruins a 2-1 line, with Viktor Arvidsson capitalizing on a brutal defensive-zone turnover by Dakota Joshua. With Mittelstadt out and Saturday call-up Alex Steeves filling his spot alongside Arvidsson and Pavel Zacha, the line didn’t miss a beat. During their 10:40 of 5-on-5 ice time, the Bruins outshot the Leafs 8-3 and had a 5-1 advantage in high-danger chances. Steeves added a physical element with a game-high five hits. Arvidsson’s five shots on goal were second only to David Pastrnak.
Speaking of Pastrnak, he had been quiet by his standards with just one point in the last three games entering Saturday. Given the key absences, you might have thought the Bruins would need Pastrnak to take over in Toronto if they were going to have a chance.
As it turns out, they got enough contributions elsewhere that they didn’t need that. They did need Pastrnak to contribute, though, and he did that early in the second with a brilliant goal to push the Bruins’ lead to 4-2. After taking a great cross-ice stretch pass from Hampus Lindholm, Pastrnak dangled right through Simon Benoit before just barely sliding the puck past Anthony Stolarz (who got pulled after that goal) for his 399th career goal.
The top line of Pastrnak, Geekie and Marat Khusnutdinov – still filling in for the injured Elias Lindholm as the center there – was pretty dominant overall Saturday. During their 11:31 together, the Bruins led Toronto in shot attempts 19-6, in shots on goal 13-4, and in goals 2-0. When they went head-to-head against the Leafs’ top line of Auston Matthews, William Nylander and Matthew Knies, shot attempts were 8-1 Bruins.
With the Maple Leafs threatening to tie the game in the third period, it was fittingly Fraser Minten and the third line that scored the all-important insurance goal with 3:02 to go. Mark Kastelic, who has proven to be a great fit with Minten and Tanner Jeannot since moving up from the fourth line, stole the puck inside the offensive blue line before setting up Minten, the former Toronto prospect who was acquired in the Brandon Carlo trade in March.
When it was all said and done, the Bruins had outscored the Leafs 4-1 at 5-on-5 play – and Toronto’s only “5-on-5” goal actually came just seconds after a power play ended. What seemed like one of their toughest challenges of the season going in turned into their most dominant 5-on-5 showing of the season.
“That’s a huge win for us,” Minten said. “Toronto’s a really good team, and they’ve been playing really good recently. Missing our best defenseman. Casey has been really, really good for us. Beech, too. Like, guys just coming in and playing our system and giving us a chance to win. I thought we did a really good job.”