Auston Matthews scored the go-ahead goal in the third period and the Toronto Maple Leafs rallied past the visiting Tampa Bay Lightning 4-3 Tuesday night in Game 5 of their first-round playoff series.
Toronto leads the best-of-seven Easter Conference series 3-2 with Game 6 at Tampa Bay on Thursday.
William Nylander had a goal and two assists for Toronto. John Tavares added a goal and an assist, and Morgan Rielly also scored.
Jack Campbell had a solid game in goal with some big saves among the 32 shots he stopped for the Maple Leafs.
Steven Stamkos, Victor Hedman and Ryan McDonagh scored for the Lightning. Nikita Kucherov added two assists and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 21 saves for Tampa Bay.
Behind 2-1 after 40 minutes, Toronto scored twice early in the third period when the teams were playing with four skaters each. Rielly scored on a 26-footer at 3:01 of the third period, and Nylander scored from the left circle at 4:14.
McDonagh’s shot from the left circle found the top corner to tie the game at 8:17 of the third.
Soon after Campbell made a superb save, Matthews finished a breakout by scoring on the rebound from Mitchell Marner’s shot at 13:54.
Tampa Bay took a 2-0 lead in the first period with two goals a minute apart. Stamkos scored from the slot at 5:19 of the first on a pass from Kucherov.
Hedman scored a power-play goal at 6:11 on a shot from the high slot through traffic. TJ Brodie was off for hooking.
Tampa Bay had a two-man advantage for 30 seconds but could not score. Nylander, the first player penalized, had a breakaway after leaving the box and was stopped by Vasilevskiy.
Tampa Bay led 14-4 in shots on goal after one period.
Tavares scored a power-play goal on a deflection of Nylander’s shot at 3:35 of the second period. Tampa Bay had been penalized for having too many men on the ice.
Against the flow of the game at 15:15 of the second, the Lightning’s Ondrej Palat had a breakaway after a steal in the neutral zone, but Campbell stopped him.
Tampa Bay had a 23-18 advantage in shots on goal after two periods.
–Field Level Media
