{"id":410193,"date":"2026-01-16T04:56:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T04:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/410193\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T04:56:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T04:56:12","slug":"marner-to-face-maple-leafs-for-1st-time-with-golden-knights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/410193\/","title":{"rendered":"Marner to face Maple Leafs for 1st time with Golden Knights"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mitch Marner<\/a> is ready to focus on facing his former team for the first time.<\/p>\n

The Vegas Golden Knights forward will play against the Toronto Maple Leafs at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Thursday (9:30 p.m. ET; ESPN, TSN4).<\/p>\n

He spent his first nine NHL seasons with the Maple Leafs before going to Vegas on July 1, agreeing to a sign-and-trade that included an eight-year, $96 million contract ($12 million average annual value).<\/p>\n

The 28-year-old forward said it wasn’t until after Vegas’ 3-2 overtime win against the Los Angeles Kings at Crypto.com Arena on Wednesday that he would allow himself to think about playing against his former team.<\/p>\n

“Been trying to just focus on our games, focus on who we’re playing and the next opponent,” Marner said late Wednesday. “I’m sure on the plane ride home it’s going to hit more that that’s (Thursday) night, and I don’t think I got to look at it any different. Just look at it as another hockey game and just try to go out there and do my thing.”<\/p>\n

Marner was one of the faces of the Maple Leafs, in good times and bad, during his time in Toronto.<\/p>\n

He had 741 points (221 goals, 520 assists) in 657 games, leaving as Toronto’s sixth all-time leading scorer in the regular season and fifth in the Stanley Cup Playoffs (63 points in 70 games).<\/p>\n

Toronto made the playoffs in each of Marner’s nine seasons, but advanced out of the first round twice, including last season, when the Maple Leafs lost in the second round to the Florida Panthers in six games.<\/p>\n

Marner has 47 points (11 goals, 36 assists) in 45 games in his first season with the Golden Knights.<\/p>\n

“Yeah, it’ll be a little different (playing against Marner), but everyone has been through the League and the game, and you know changes happen every year,” Maple Leafs forward John Tavares told reporters after Toronto’s morning skate at T-Mobile Arena. “It’s not the first time we’re playing against a former player. Obviously, he was a big part of things here and you develop a close relationship.”<\/p>\n

Marner said he has kept in touch with several of his longtime former teammates, including Auston Matthews<\/a> and William Nylander<\/a>, who he also could play against next month in the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026.<\/p>\n

Marner will represent Canada in the Olympics. Matthews will play for the United States and Nylander for Sweden, along with Maple Leafs defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“I mean, I’m still obviously very good buddies with a lot of them, so I’ve checked in with them and just see how they’re doing, how their families are doing,” Marner said. “Talked to them over Christmas and holidays. Like I said, got really close with a lot of them there, and they’re like brothers. But, yeah, hasn’t been too much talk about hockey really.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mitch Marner is ready to focus on facing his former team for the first time. The Vegas Golden…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":410194,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-410193","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-nhl","9":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=410193"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410193\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/410194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=410193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=410193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=410193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}