Maple Leafs vs. Flames: Gridin Scores Twice as Calgary Ends Toronto's Streak 5-2

Maple Leafs vs. Flames: a 5-2 loss and a worse injury

The Maple Leafs vs. Flames game on Oct. 26 cost Toronto twice. Matvei Gridin scored two goals, Devin Cooley made 26 saves and the Calgary Flames won 5-2 at the Scotiabank Saddledome, ending the Leafs' four-game winning streak. Worse, Kirill Marchenko left in the second period with a lower-body injury and did not return.

Toronto falls to 7-5-2 with two games left on its western trip. Calgary has now won four straight. The night did produce one piece of history: Auston Matthews assisted on William Nylander's third-period goal for his 800th career point, the fastest any Maple Leaf has reached the mark. That deserves its own space, and we gave it one in our breakdown of Matthews' 800th point.

The result itself was earned by Calgary. Toronto chased the game from the 10-minute mark of the first period and never drew level.

How the Flames built the lead

Gridin opened the scoring at 10:05 of the first, picking the top corner on Sergei Bobrovsky's short side from a sharp angle off the left wing. That is a shot an NHL starter is expected to stop, and Bobrovsky will know it.

Mikael Backlund, back in the lineup after missing two games with an upper-body injury, made it 2-0 just 1:45 later. The goal started with an Easton Cowan turnover in his own end, a drop pass that Joel Farabee picked off. Gridin then scored on the power play 25 seconds into the second period, and that goal stood as the winner.

Here is how the scoring went, from the NHL.com and ESPN game summaries.

Toronto's push came too late

Cowan made up for part of his mistake at 12:54 of the second, redirecting a slap pass from Troy Stecher past Cooley to get Toronto on the board. Nylander then pulled the Leafs within one at 6:06 of the third, finishing a cross-crease feed from Jack Roslovic. Nylander's goal came two nights after he reached 300 career goals in the 7-2 win in Edmonton, a milestone we covered in our look at where Nylander sits on the franchise list.

That was as close as it got. Toronto had most of the third period to find an equalizer and could not solve Cooley, who finished with 26 saves on 28 shots. Farabee and Pospisil hit the empty net in the final 1:25.

Bobrovsky finished with 29 saves on 32 shots, per the official box score. (Some recaps list 30 saves; the box score has 29.) The first goal was the soft one. The other two came off a turnover and a power play, and the Leafs in front of him did not help.

Kirill Marchenko's injury is the real story

Marchenko went down in the second period after a hit from Yegor Sharangovich. His left leg appeared to get caught under him as he went into the boards. He came back for one more 14-second shift, then left, and the Leafs announced before the third period that he would not return with a lower-body injury.

Jim Hiller had no diagnosis after the game. He told reporters he did not have the full update, but that a player who cannot come back and finish a game is never a good sign. That is about as honest as a coach gets the night of an injury.

The timing could hardly be worse. Marchenko came into the night with six goals and 14 points in 13 games as a Leaf, including four power-play goals, according to ESPN's season log. Toronto is already without John Tavares (week-to-week, lower body), Dakota Joshua (long-term injured reserve) and Chris Tanev on the blue line. We look at what the Leafs lose and how Hiller can cover it in our Marchenko injury breakdown.

Easton Cowan's night, good and bad

Cowan's game was the whole season in miniature. The turnover on the Backlund goal was a young player trying to make a play through the middle of his own zone when the boards were the right answer. The goal was a young player going to the net and getting his stick on a hard pass. Cowan took responsibility for the loss after the game, per The Leafs Nation.

LeafsLurker's view: own it, file it, move on. Cowan has been one of Toronto's most productive forwards in October, and one drop pass in Calgary does not change that. A coach who benches him for it would be teaching the wrong lesson. Hiller has used Cowan in the top six, and with Marchenko hurt he will likely need him there even more.

Three takeaways from the Saddledome

The first 12 minutes decided it. Down 2-0 before the midpoint of the first period, on the road, against a hot goalie, the Leafs spent the rest of the night pressing. Calgary was happy to sit back, block shots and wait for mistakes, and the Leafs supplied one of them on the Backlund goal.

The penalty kill gave up the winner. Gridin's second goal came 25 seconds into the second period on a power play, before Toronto had a chance to reset after the intermission. A team trailing 2-0 cannot afford to hand an opponent a man advantage at the start of a period, and a three-goal deficit against Cooley was always going to be too much.

The top line still produced. Matthews, Nylander and Roslovic combined on the goal that made it 3-2, and Toronto had the better of the third period until the empty-netters. The issue was not effort or top-end skill. It was a lineup with too many holes to sustain pressure for 60 minutes, and that problem gets worse, not better, if Marchenko misses time.

What the loss says about the trip

Before the trip, we argued that five of eight points out west was the bar. Toronto has two of four with Seattle and Vancouver to come, so the target is still reachable but now requires wins in both. That is a fair ask, and Seattle is playing without leading forward Jared McCann.

The bigger concern is depth. With Tavares, Marchenko and Joshua out, Toronto's forward group gets thin quickly. In Calgary, a third line built around Gavin McKenna and Colton Sissons had to carry real minutes, and AHL depth like Vinni Lettieri was in the projected lineup. That is not a lineup built to win games 2-1 in a building like the Saddledome, and it showed.

Monday was also billed as the Leafs' final visit to the Saddledome, with the Flames due to move into their new arena. The old barn sent Toronto off the way it often has: tight, physical and costly.

What's next for the Leafs

Toronto plays in Seattle on Wednesday, Oct. 28, at Climate Pledge Arena (10 p.m. ET), then finishes the trip in Vancouver on Oct. 31. The two questions before puck drop in Seattle are Marchenko's status and who starts in goal. Anthony Stolarz made 30 saves in the 7-2 win in Edmonton on Oct. 24, and we have already made the case that Stolarz has earned the net. Monday did nothing to change that view.

For the standings picture, check the Atlantic Division on our standings page. For where each Leaf sits on the cap, our contracts page has the full sheet.