The Maple Leafs broke with tradition and defeated a bottom of the barrel team tonight, and reminded Kyle Dubas what a stupid idea it was to sign Petr Mrazek to the Leafs. Thank God he got out of that deal.

First. Here's some pregame Mark Giordano.

William Nylander set the tone with a goal only nine seconds into the game.

It was a short lived high though, as Calle Jarnkrok made a bad play that gave possible (?) future Leaf Sam Lafferty the chance to tie the game seconds later.

Rasmus Sanding would get the lead back, making it 2-1 Toronto midway through the first.

It looks like Alex Kerfoot doubles the lead after a beauty pass from Mitch Marner...

But it's offside.

Auston Matthews is back from his injury and ready to pick up where he left off.

Outside of Leafs goals, they're playing all aspects of the game well.

After one period, it's 3-1 Toronto.

For your intermission pleasure.

The first goal of the second is the from the bad guys as no one is watching Philip Kurashev and he makes it 3-2 Chicago.

Liljegren is making sure any trade can't knock him out of the lineup.

John Tavares doesn't care for this and scores to get the two goal lead back.

Then it's Conor Timmins turn to get one in the net.

After two it's 5-2 Toronto.

Here's your intermission interview.

Timmins shows that he's not just a goal scorer either.

Auston Matthews won't be outdone in shot blocking.

The Maple Leafs aren't lighting up Chicago on the third but they are showing off.

The game ends with a score of 5-2. The Leafs played as they should (Jarnkrok mistake notwithstanding) against a team like Chicago.

It was good, they scored a lot, and made some trade targets look silly, hopefully lowering their value.

The Leafs have a back to back weekend, with Montreal on town Saturday night and then they go to Chicago on Sunday.

Yes, a two day gap between games to make us all crazy with trade speculation.

Enjoy!

Game Coverage