Nylander scores twice, Maple Leafs get past Penguins

William Nylander scored twice for the Toronto Maple Leafs in a 4-2 win against the Pittsburgh Penguins at Scotiabank Arena on Saturday.

“Maybe it wasn’t our cleanest game,” Nylander said, “but I think we battled through it, played our systems pretty well, just competed and won battles and got the ‘W’ tonight.”

Mitch Marner had a goal and an assist, and Anthony Stolarz made 21 saves in his first victory for the Maple Leafs (2-1-0), who have won two in a row and were playing their home opener. The Maple Leafs signed Stolarz to a two-year, $5 million contract ($2.5 million average annual value) as an unrestricted free agent July 2.

“It’s obviously exciting [to get my first win], especially to do it at the home opener in front of this crowd,” Stolarz said. “It was a lot of fun out there. They gave a good push in that third period, but just to be able to come out on top, it’s extremely special to me.”

Toronto was without forward John Tavares because of an illness.

Kris Letang and Rickard Rakell scored, and Evgeni Malkin had two assists to reach 1,300 NHL points for the Penguins (1-2-0). Joel Blomqvist made 29 saves.

“It’s nice but it’s the last thing I’m thinking about,” Malkin said about the milestone. “We didn’t win. That’s more important than stats or records. We need to play a bit better … every line.”

Matthew Knies put the Maple Leafs up 2-1 at 2:53 of the second period. Morgan Rielly’s shot from the blue line ricocheted off the end boards, hit the side of the net and bounced into the slot, where Knies collected the rebound and shot over Blomqvist’s glove.

“We sustained some O-zone pressure there and [Rielly] made a pretty good play just bouncing it off the wall there, getting it in front of the net,” Knies said. “It kind of popped through some skates, I don’t think anyone was ready for it and I was fortunate to bury it.”

Marner made it 3-1 at 2:12 of the third period when he got to a loose puck in the defensive zone, skated past Pittsburgh defenseman Marcus Pettersson at the red line and shot to the blocker side from the right face-off circle.

“Just tried to read it in our defensive zone, lucky enough I made the right read on it,” Marner said. “I was able to chip it with speed and saw an opening on the blocker side.”

Rakell cut it to 3-2 at 12:29 of the third period when he took a drop pass from Malkin and scored with a wrist shot from the top of the slot.

“We had a great start tonight, and after [that] we lost momentum a little bit,” Malkin said. “But we scored [the] second goal, have chances 6-on-5, we’re fighting. But we have to play smarter for sure.”

Stolarz preserved the one-goal lead, stopping Lars Eller in the slot at 17:56 by kicking out the right pad.

Nylander scored into an empty net with 22 seconds left for the 4-2 final.

“I think it’s our 5-on-5 game that went on a decline after the first period,” Letang said. “So obviously, the power play follows that. We just have to be able to reset sometimes and just go back to work.”

The Penguins went up 1-0 on the power play at 10:58 of the first period when Letang skated in from the offensive blue line and put a slap shot over Stolarz’s glove from the top of the right circle. Sidney Crosby assisted on the goal for his 1,599th NHL point.

“Early on, I thought our legs weren’t there and our hands weren’t there,” Toronto coach Craig Berube said. They come hard, Pittsburgh — they’re a very good forechecking team with a lot of pressure. We were under siege but our structure didn’t break on it, we held our ground and our goalie made some saves.”

Nylander tied it 1-1 at 50 seconds of the second period when he one-timed a pass from Max Domi on a 2-on-0.

“I was pretty shocked that happened; 2-on-0s are kind of hard because you don’t know exactly what the goalie might be cheating [toward] on the play, but Max made a great play, so all I had to do was put it in there,” Nylander said. “He kind of faked me out a little bit. I wasn’t ready, but he usually passes, so in the back of my mind I thought he was going to pass it.”

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