It’s getting closer! The Leafs, thanks to a dominant first period, pulled off a huge 4-2 victory over the Buffalo Sabres tonight, bringing a potential clinch of a playoff spot to as soon as tomorrow night. Here’s what went down:

This game got off to a hot start, with 4 minutes of consecutive action. Alexander Nylander looked like he had a jump in his step from his call-up. Mitch Marner was also flying around, creating zone time for the Leafs but was ultimately unable to do more than kill time.

The first whistle comes at 16:08 and it comes with roughness as the rival re-builders show their disdain for each other.

The first goal of the game comes on the stick of Leo Komarov, who has been on fire lately. Brown causes a turnover on a bad pass by Lehner, which is picked up by Kadri who finds Komarov alone at the side of the net. 1-0 Leafs.

This was immediately followed up by just a ridiculous play by both William Nylander and Auston Matthews. Nylander creates a turnover, dances around the Buffalo defender into the side boards, changes direction and finds Mathews in the slot. Matthews makes no mistake with it, and puts a beautiful wrist shot into the top corner past Robin Lehner. 2-0 Leafs.

And again, immediately after that, right off of a faceoff, James Van Riemdsdyk takes a set play pass from Tyler Bozak and immediately beats Lehner on the far side. Not a great look there on Lehner, who gets pulled right afterwards. 3-0 Leafs.

Going back to the Matthews goal, it breaks Peter Ihnacak’s record for points by a rookie. Auston’s 67th point cements himself in Maple Leafs history, for the 2nd time after breaking Clark’s rookie goals record. Makes you think that there are a few more records Matthews may break over the course of his career.

The Leafs continued to get chances and displaying their dominance, but Anders Nilsson was looking solid in relief of Lehner.

The Sabres finished the period taking two frustration penalties. One would assume they are attempting to intimidate the Leafs but the referees won’t let them do so outside the rulebook. The period ends 3-0 Leafs.

The Leafs start this period on a 5-on-3 for 13 seconds as a result of the Sabres’ penalties. But the Leafs were unable to capitalize.

The Sabres finally showed some sign of life as Ryan O’Reilly picked up a breakaway chance that he buried, on an unfortunate failure in blue line aggressiveness by Jake Gardiner. 3-1 Leafs.

Some more frustration play from the Sabres as Evander Kane first hits Freddie Andersen with his glove on his way by the net, and on the next play slashes Nazem Kadri on the thumb. Both were uncalled.

Not much else would happen here in the second period, and it would end at 3-1 for Toronto.

Early in the 3rd, Jack Eichel runs Marner on a bad looking hit into the boards which sends the Leafs to the powerplay. The Leafs score on a beautiful shot through the 5-hole by Kadri, which starts a scrum of the Sabres complaining about Kadri going for a shove against Ristolainen after the goal. Unfortunately, the move sends the Leafs to a penalty kill – their first against a very dangerous Buffalo powerplay.

The Sabres, however, would be unsuccessful despite all the powerplay dominance they’ve had this year.

Once again, there has been a void of action as the Sabres seem to have accepted defeat and the Leafs, in turn, easing off the gas pedal. A dangerous situation for the Leafs though – the emotion will pick up for the Sabres soon as the clock winds down.

In the final minute the period, Jack Eichel streaks down the ice and beats Andersen for the Sabres’ second goal of the game. But that would be the final score. 4-2 for the Maple Leafs.

The Leafs were very clearly the more dominant team tonight. The whole team looked dangerous, and were defensively solid save for one or two lapses. Certainly not a measuring stick game against as the win took advantage of a tired and not very good Sabres club. But still, an encouraging sight to see the Leafs on top of their game when they needed to be.

So many players were good tonight it’s hard to pick just three, so I’m going to go with my instinct here:

The Leafs inch ever closer to clinching a playoff spot with this win tonight. Catch them in action again tomorrow against Washington at 7:30PM Eastern Time. Goodnight, and go Leafs.