You can only hope to contain them': Bolts aim to bottle up Matthews, Marner again

SPORTSCENTRE Reporter

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The Maple Leafs and Tampa Bay Lightning held optional skates at Amalie Arena on Sunday. TSN's Mark Masters has more.

For the first time in the series, Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner were held off the scoresheet at even strength in Game 3. Tampa's shutdown line of Brayden Point, Anthony Cirelli and Alex Killorn kept Toronto's dynamic duo in check.

"Point, Cirelli and Killorn neutralized those guys pretty well, but it still didn't translate to a win so that's unfortunate," said coach Jon Cooper, "but if we can keep doing that it's good for us."

Easier said than done. 

"What's the line?" Cooper asked rhetorically. "'You can only hope to contain them,' and I thought they did a pretty good job of containing them."

Shot attempts favoured the Lightning 13-0 when Point, Cirelli and Killorn were on the ice together in five-on-five play during the first two periods on Friday, per NaturalStatTrick.  

"They smother you defensively," said Alex Kerfoot, who replaced Michael Bunting on the top line in the third period. "Just their energy, they're all over you. They got really good sticks and they don't make a lot of mistakes. They don't give you anything easy. They make you work for everything."

"They've done a heck of a job," said Lightning forward Corey Perry. "They were skating. They were physical. They were hard on the puck and they had some chances and eventually those things will start going in for us. You can't say enough about what they did the other night and they will continue to do that." 

Cooper tweaked his lines in the third period on Friday flipping Killorn and Nikita Kucherov, but will be going back to the original look to start Game 4.

Auston Matthews was held off the scoresheet