Canucks storm back in 3rd period to down Maple Leafs

Alex Chiasson scored the winner and Thatcher Demko made 34 saves as the Vancouver Canucks came back from a goal down in the third period to defeat the Toronto Maple Leafs 6-4 on Saturday night.

Auston Matthews replied with his 38th and 39th goals of the season for Toronto (35-16-4) to retake the NHL lead. John Tavares, with a goal and an assist, and Nick Robertson also scored for the Leafs, who got 23 stops from Jack Campbell.

Toronto winger Wayne Simmonds played the 1,000th regular-season game of his career.

WATCH | Alex Chiasson lifts Canucks over Leafs:

The Leafs led 4-3 after two periods, but Vancouver responded 63 seconds into the third when Pearson squeezed his 12th through Campbell on a tip.

Vancouver then took the lead at 6:55 on a broken play where Mitch Marner lost his stick in the Toronto zone. Horvat threw a puck in front that the Leafs winger tried to kick away with his skate, but it dropped for Chiasson to snap his sixth past Campbell.

Toronto's top ranked power play got a chance to equalize midway through the period when Canucks defenceman Luke Schenn was whistled for delay of game, but Demko was there to deny William Nylander on the Leafs' best opportunity.

The Canucks went up 3-1 at 4:12 of the second period on a power play when Boeser scored his 16th off the rebound of Miller's initial shot.

Toronto responded 1:21 later when Robertson — elevated to the second line in his fourth game since being recalled from the AHL — took a pass from Nylander and fired his first regular-season goal past Demko.

The Vancouver goaltender, who made a career-high 51 saves in the Canucks' 3-2 victory over Toronto on Feb. 12, then denied Simmonds on his milestone night with a stop at full stretch off a Jason Spezza feed.

Sitt