Nylander extends point streak to 15, Maple Leafs surge past Canucks

William Nylander scored to extend his season-opening point streak to 15 games, and the Toronto Maple Leafs defeated the Vancouver Canucks 5-2 at Scotiabank Arena on Saturday.

Nylander has 22 points (10 goals, 12 assists) during the streak.

“He’s a man on a mission,” Toronto forward Bobby McMann said. “That goal today, he just wasn’t going to be stopped. He finds a way to put it in. It is fun to watch.”

Noah Gregor had a goal and an assist, and Tyler Bertuzzi, Max Domi and McMann each had two assists for the Maple Leafs (8-5-2), who have won three of four. They were coming off a 5-4 shootout win against the Calgary Flames here Friday.

Toronto’s next game is against the Detroit Red Wings in Stockholm on Friday (2 p.m. ET; BSDET, NHLN, TSN4) in the 2023 NHL Global Series Sweden presented by Fastenal.

“It gives us some confidence going into Sweden,” Gregor said. “It was a tough back-to-back with Vancouver coming in pretty hot. They were playing really well, so this is a big game to build on.”

Ilya Samsonov made 31 saves for his first win since Oct. 14. He was 0-1-2 in his previous five games, getting pulled twice.

“I thought he was solid,” Toronto coach Sheldon Keefe said. “Gives up a couple there in the first period and that can get in your head, but he didn’t allow it to. I also thought the guys took really good care of him. At 5-on-5, we gave up very little tonight and we’ve been talking about trending in a good direction. It seems like almost every game we are setting a new standard for our play defensively.”

J.T. Miller and Pius Suter scored, and Thatcher Demko made 17 saves for the Canucks (10-3-1), who had a five-game winning streak end.

“We have to be careful,” Vancouver coach Rick Tocchet said. “If things are slipping in our game, we’ve got to address it as a group. I thought the last few games there’s pockets of the game where I think teams are outworking us. We’ve got to play desperate hockey too. You have to match the level your opponent. Like I said, it’s 82 games. There’s some stinkers and sometimes you learn from a stinker.”

Gregor put the Maple Leafs up 3-2 at 14:22 of the second period when he took a pass from Morgan Rielly and shot high to the glove side from above the left face-off dot.

Nicholas Robertson made it 4-2 at 4:56 of the third period. He backhanded a shot in the slot after Domi forced a turnover by Quinn Hughes behind the net.

“Oh, that was a great play,” Robertson said. “I was coming off the bench and just seeing where the puck went and it was right in front of me, so all I had to do was shoot it, and luckily it went in.”

David Kampf pushed the lead to 5-2 at 9:13 when he deflected Gregor’s shot at the top of the goal crease for his first goal of the season.

“You have to give Toronto credit,” Tocchet said. “They were the more desperate team that played well. They deserve the game, quite frankly.”

Suter gave the Canucks a 2-1 lead on the power play at 15:48 of the first period, scoring with a backhand in the slot on the rebound of Anthony Beauvillier’s shot.

The Maple Leafs tied it 2-2 at 4:53 of the second when Nylander banked a shot off Canucks defenseman Tyler Myers from behind the net for his 10th goal of the season.

Toronto killed off a short-handed stretch of 3:37 short-handed beginning at 5:43 of the second, including a 23-second 5-on-3.

“Well, the power play did a good job of getting momentum for us in the first and then it did the exact opposite for us after that,” Miller said after Vancouver went 2-for-6 with the man-advantage. “From that point on, they seemed to take over the game just a little bit. Starts with me. I lost three face-offs in a row to get the advantage.”

Vancouver went up 1-0 at 5:43 of the first period on Miller’s power-play goal from the top of the left circle.

Matthew Knies tied it 1-1 at 8:39 when he jammed in a loose puck at the top of the crease.

The Canucks outshot the Maple Leafs 12-4 in the first period.