William Nylander brought the Leafs the victory in OT last night with his 33rd goal of the season, and was it ever a fun one after a big flub by the Wild’s Frederick Gaudreau.

Here’s the video version if you want to listen to the call in all its glory:

The Leafs have a rare Saturday off tonight as they embark on a Western Canada + Seattle road trip; the latter destination being the first game which they will play tomorrow. Br prepared for a few late night games next week, but don’t worry they will still have the traditional 7:00 p.m. ET start when they play the Canucks, and we in Ontario will all get to enjoy the outrage from Canucks fans about the time of that game.

Marlies

While the Leafs are off on the other side of the continent the Marlies are still in town and they have a busy weekend, starting this afternoon with a game against the Laval Rocket at 4:00 p.m., and then another game tomorrow against the Syracuse Crunch, again at 4:00.

We’ll keep you up to date on the results, but as of now the Marlies still sit first place in the AHL North Division.

The Marlies also made an unusual sequence of contract moves in the past week, first finally signing goalie Dylan Ferguson to a full time AHL contract after he spent most of this season-to-date on a try-out contract, and then immediately announcing they were sending him to play in the ECHL for the Wichita Thunder, which itself is not that unusual as the Marlies have loaned players to that team several times before, so there must be some kind of organisational relationship between them.

But then, only one day later, they reversed course and traded Ferguson to the Belleville Senators in exchange for... nothing.

Exactly what happened here is unclear, though most likely the Senators called up the Marlies and asked for Ferguson on learning he was available. We shall see where he ultimately ends up, but for now it appears everyone is satisfied with the end result as even Wichita found someone to fill their immediate needs.

Other News

Leafs prospect Mike Koster was scoring all the goals for the University of Minnesota last night.

Here’s #1:

Here’s #2, assisted by the Leafs other prospect ont he team, Matt Knies:

The Department of Player Safety had a busy day yesterday.

Marchand fined $5,000 for “dangerous trip” on Oliver Bjorkstrand - Stanley Cup of Chowder
You’ll notice that the league did not call what Marchand did a “slew foot,” and that’s a term it has used in such cases in the past.

Erik Cernak suspended for two games for elbowing Kyle Okposo - Raw Charge
This isn’t Cernak’s first dance with DoPS as he was suspended for two games after Rasmus Dahlin back in 2019. Another play that wasn’t whistled by the refs.

This might be the most hopeless the Penguins have felt in more than 20 years - PensBurgh
When the score got to 5-1, the “Fire Hextall” chants started. When IceBurgh attempted to get out in front of it and start honking his horn to hopefully inspire a “Let’s Go Pens” chant, the fans simply changed the cadence to have the “Fire Hextall” follow the horn. Then the horn stopped. The Penguins were booed off the ice after the second period. [SPECIES: This could be their first miss of the playoffs since the 2005-06 season which was Sidney Crosby’s first in the league.]

15-year-old hockey phenom from Yukon takes the spotlight at Canada Games - CBC
Yukon forward Gavin McKenna, who's already seen as a top NHL prospect, has taken the Canada Games by storm.

From The Branches