You couldn’t script the past two weeks any better.

Take on a playoff rival on Amazon’s Monday Night Hockey and beat them convincingly. Drop two losses in a row to teams that will more than likely miss the playoffs. Lose to your biggest playoff demon over the past decade on a terrible giveaway in overtime. And then hand the NHL’s last remaining undefeated team their first loss of the season on the following week’s Amazon broadcast.

A week in the life of the Toronto Maple Leafs, baby.

The Maple Leafs came out swinging against the Jets, led by the team’s new second line of John Tavares, William Nylander, and Max Pacioretty. The line combined for nine points, including a hat trick for John Tavares, a three-assist night for Pacioretty, and a three-point night for Nylander with a goal and two assists.

The game also featured some new-look power play units, with Tavares and Nylander on the second unit in favour of Pacioretty and Matthew Knies, who scored his fifth goal of the season. While they didn’t capitalize on either of their power plays, there seems to have been a clear directive from head coach Craig Berube to take as many shots as possible. The bar is on the floor, but it was a refreshing change from the usual perimeter play and shots into the shin pads of defenders. If nothing else, those shots to the net will eventually start translating into goals — it’s just a matter of whether they can keep up the good habits instead of reverting to old ones.

Another shoutout goes to Morgan Rielly, who scored his third goal of the season and already has nearly half the goals he had in 2023-24.

He seems to be a bit of a swinging pendulum when it comes to offensive production, and with a 20-goal season under his belt, we know he’s capable of putting pucks in the net from the back end.

The Maple Leafs are back in action on Thursday night when they host the Seattle Kraken.

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