The Toronto Maple Leafs missed out on a golden opportunity to gain ground the Atlantic Division leaders Tuesday night, blowing a 5-1 lead against the Florida Panthers and losing 7-6 in overtime.
After taking a four-goal lead in the second period, the Maple Leafs allowed five straight goals to the Panthers before John Tavares scored on the power play.
After blowing a 5-1 lead to the Panthers before falling in overtime, the TSN Hockey panel discusses what went wrong for the Leafs after such a positive start thanks to Mitch Marner, and praises the dynamic duo of Aleksander Barkov and Jonathan Huberdeau in Florida's comeback win.
"You don't want wild swings in a game where we had control," Maple Leafs forward Jason Spezza said. "When we have control like that, you want to lock it down. You have to learn from it. It's a team we're likely to see again."
The Panthers increased their lead in the standings over the Maple Leafs to eight points with 12 games remaining for both teams. If the playoffs started today, The Panthers would face the Washington Capitals, while the Maple Leafs would take on the Tampa Bay Lightning, with the winners of those two series playing each other in the second round.
Florida converted on three of six power plays in their comeback, and while unhappy with that stat, Maple Leafs head coach Sheldon Keefe said he was keeping his focus on the positives from the loss.
"We go from having a chance on a breakaway to go up 6-1 to taking a too-many-men-on ice penalty right after," Keefe said. "That starts the snowball. We had pretty terrible penalty killing. I'm not going to focus on all that stuff, I'm going to focus on the fact we played a good hockey game today."
The Panthers recovered from a four-goal
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