Leafs sweep and win rookie tournament with OT win over Penguins

Many of the Leafs’ rookies got their last chance to impress against their own age and skill level today, in the third and final exhibition matchup for the blue and white in their annual London, Ontario mini-tournament. Standing in the way of their potential perfect record were the Pittsburgh Penguins, who certainly made the process difficult, but the youngsters persevered and got the result they wanted in sudden death.

The game definitely didn’t start off the way the Leafs wanted to. After losing a first-minute goal to a (very correct) offside call, Milos Bubela opened the scoring for Pittsburgh. It was a play where the entire team seemed to lose track of him, as he curled to the left wing, jolted past Stephen Desrocher, and beat Kasimir Kaskisuo with a well-aimed shot less than five minutes into the first period. To make matters worse, Michael Webster doubled the damage not much later, putting Toronto in an unexpectedly tough spot.

The Leafs didn’t respond terribly well, appearing to be more focused on shifting the tone through intimidation rather than through puck control. It showed, too, as penalties began to rack up. Truthfully, they were lucky to get out of the first period without more inflicted damage, but Kaskisuo and the penalty killing unit held the fort.

It didn’t look like the second period would go much better than the first, with Teddy Blueger widening the gap to 3-0, but energetic blood began re-pumping in the team’s veins. Toronto got themselves on the board shortly after with a play orchestrated by Nikita Korostelev and Mason Marchment, with the former getting around their defenceman and setting up the latter. Not much later, Tony Cameranesei’s attempt to set up Andrew Neilsen didn’t go as planned, but the whiffed on puck went directly onto Jeremy Bracco’s tape; he made no mistake from there.

Before you knew it, things were all square once again; this time, Korostelev was the driving force, wrapping around the crease to earn himself an extremely wide open net in which to deposit the puck past Casey DeSmith. Against anybody’s expectation, the second-period buzzer gave an even playing field to the game for the final twenty minutes of regulation.

That last frame was just as absurd as the others. Andrew Neilsen gave the Leafs their first lead of the game with a point shot not overly different from the one he scored yesterday, and Korostelev grabbed his second of the night giving the illusion of insurance. But just like the Leafs could come back, the Pens could too; CJ Yakimowicz and Dominik Simon caused enough trouble for Kaskisuo to send the game to overtime.

At the end of the day, though, the Leafs weren’t leaving without the rhetorical two points. Jake Guentzel almost gave the Penguins the win on a breakaway but hit the post. Not long afterward, Bracco had a similar opportunity, which he was more successful in converting.

With the win, the Leafs finish the tournament with a perfect record; by virtue of round robin, that also gives them the best. To the victor goes, well, bragging rights for management; the players will continue to do their best to impress in training camp and beyond while they compete for NHL and AHL roster spots and contracts.