Benoit wins Game 3 in OT, Maple Leafs on verge of sweeping Senators
Simon Benoit scored at 1:19 of overtime to give the Toronto Maple Leafs a 3-2 win against the Ottawa Senators in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference First Round at Canadian Tire Centre on Thursday.
“I guess I was keeping that one for the playoffs,” said Benoit, who scored one goal in 78 regular-season games. “I don’t score often, so that one is pretty cool. But as long as we get that win, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter who scores, as long as we get that win and just keep going.”
Auston Matthews won a face-off in the left circle back to Benoit, whose slap shot beat Linus Ullmark through traffic.
“It’s always great when a guy like that scores a goal,” Maple Leafs coach Craig Berube said. “A big goal like that, overtime goal, game-winner. ‘Beny’ has played extremely well for us defensively and being hard to play against and does all of those things. So, it’s nice when guys like that are rewarded with a big goal.”
Matthews had a goal and an assist, Mitch Marner had two assists, and Anthony Stolarz made 18 saves for Toronto, which is the top seed from the Atlantic Division.
“You can’t be satisfied with where you’re at now,” Marner said. “The next one’s going to be the hardest and you’ve got to be ready for that.”
Claude Giroux had a goal and an assist, Brady Tkachuk scored, and Ullmark made 17 saves for the Senators, who are the first wild card from the East.
“Same thing like we did last game as well,” Ullmark said. “We’re battling back, we’re doing a lot of good things, a lot of good things. But sometimes it comes down to Lady Luck. And you know what? With Lady Luck, you’ve got to earn it. That’s what you’ve got to do, earn it every night. It’s not going to come for free, that’s for sure.”
The Maple Leafs lead the best-of-7 series 3-0 and have the opportunity to complete the sweep in Ottawa on Saturday (7 p.m. ET; CBC, SN, TVAS, MAX, truTV, TBS).
“There’s not much I’m going to say to them right now that’s going to help or make them feel any better,” Senators coach Travis Green said. “It’s disheartening, to say the least. I thought both teams played a hell of a game. And sometimes playoff hockey comes down to little inches or bounces, and we were on the wrong end of it tonight.”
Giroux gave Ottawa a 1-0 lead at 1:38 of the second period when he fluttered a wrist shot from the point past a screened Stolarz on a 5-on-3 power play.
“It’s tough. We played a pretty solid game,” Giroux said. “We’re playing some good hockey. One shot away again, and it’s definitely very frustrating, but no need to pout and think of what could’ve been. We’ve got to move on here, we’ve got to move to Game 4. The fans were incredible tonight. It was incredible to play in front of those fans. It definitely gave us a boost. All we have to do right now is just worry about Game 4.”
Matthew Knies’ centering pass deflected off Senators center Shane Pinto’s skate in front and trickled over the goal line on a power play to tie it 1-1 at 8:31. Toronto was 1-for-2 on the man-advantage on Thursday and is 5-for-9 (55.6 percent) during the series.
“You have a lot of star talent with those four guys there,” Knies said of the first power-play unit. “I’ve just got to park my big [behind] in front and create havoc, take that ‘D’ away, take the [goalie’s] eyes away, and those guys make plays. Luckily, we found a bounce tonight to get us going.”
Matthews put the Maple Leafs ahead 2-1 just 32 seconds into the third period. Morgan Rielly got the puck at the left point and dumped it in behind the net to Marner, who fed Matthews with a touch pass for a one-timer at the bottom of the right circle.
“I just saw eye-on-eye with ‘Mo’. I knew he was going to rim that around to me,” Marner said. “Just took a quick glance around, and I knew Auston was there and I knew I just had to kind of, I guess, make it through one guy’s feet and I was lucky enough to be able to do it with just one touch. Usually when you give [Matthews] that look, he’s never missing.”
Tkachuk beat Stolarz with a wrist shot from the top of the left face-off circle on the rush to tie it 2-2 at 11:22.
“Back-to-back games it’s a one-shot game,” Tkachuk said. “I mean, this obviously isn’t the situation we drew up, but make it the hardest of them all. I’ve been saying this a lot: It’s not too long ago that I watched the Red Sox vs. Yankees documentary when they came back from 0-3. So, it’s been done before and I have the belief that it can be done again.”
