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<\/p>\nAuston Matthews scored his team-leading 11th goal of the season as the Leafs halted a two-game losing skid.<\/p>\n
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William Nylander and Teddy Blueger both had a goal and an assist. Zack MacEwen also scored for Toronto (8-6-2), which wrapped up a four-game road trip (2-2-0).<\/p>\n
Brock Boeser, on the power play, and Max Sasson scored for the Canucks (3-12-1).<\/p>\n
Canucks goaltender Leevi Merilainen made 24 saves.<\/p>\n
Leafs goalie Anthony Stolarz stopped 26 shots and also earned an assist on Blueger\u2019s empty-net goal.<\/p>\n
Vancouver played well in the first period, with Boeser scoring on a breakaway to tie the score 1-1.<\/p>\n
The Leafs controlled most of the second period with Matthews and MacEwen scoring. Sasson made things interesting early in the third, drawing the Canucks to within a goal by scoring off the rebound of a Brendan Gallagher shot.<\/p>\n
After losing games by five, three and four goals earlier in the year, Vancouver has tightened up defensively. Six of their last eight losses have been by two goals or less.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think our team has played a lot better hockey of late,\u201d said Boeser, who scored his fifth goal of the year. \u201cIt\u2019s something we can build on.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re generating more shots and I think our defensive game is coming along and getting better. You\u2019ve got to look at the little things. As long as those are improving, then we\u2019ve got to build off those. We\u2019ve got to stick with the process here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Malhotra liked the Canucks\u2019 forecheck in the first period and the way the team was able to sustain offensive zone pressure. Vancouver also received strong goaltending from Merilainen, especially when he stopped first-overall pick Gavin McKenna on a power-play chance in the first period.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery game he\u2019s played this year he\u2019s given us an opportunity to win,\u201d said Malhotra. \u201cHe\u2019s made some incredible stops.\u201d<\/p>\n
After missing the playoffs the last two years, and finishing last overall last season, the Canucks knew they faced a rebuild this campaign.<\/p>\n
Malhotra said the coaching staff tries to highlight the positive.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs coaches it\u2019s very easy to watch video and point out all the negatives but you\u2019ve got to catch them doing it,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen there are positives we tend to praise those things and celebrate those things and hope we see more of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sasson said staying positive in the dressing room isn\u2019t always easy.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s tough,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got a lot of good guys in this room, a lot of guys that want it. You\u2019ve just got to stick with it, stick with the process. It\u2019s super clich\u00e9 but that\u2019s all you can do.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou keep getting yourself in tight games \u2026 and limit their scoring chances and (you\u2019ll) turn this thing around.\u201d<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 31, 2026.<\/p>\n
Jim Morris, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Auston Matthews scored his team-leading 11th goal of the season as the Leafs halted a two-game losing skid.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":954017,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194298],"tags":[49,48,55],"class_list":["post-954016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-vancouver","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-vancouver"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=954016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/954017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=954016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=954016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=954016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}