Toronto Marlies Report: Rising to Challenges with Stellar Play and Grit – Hockey Writers – Toronto Marlies

The Toronto Maple Leafs' American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate, the Toronto Marlies, continue to prove they are the top team this season, picking up five points in a possible three-game sweep this week. From a thrilling overtime finish to a rare West Coast game, the team showed its ability to compete under adversity.

A record fifth straight overtime game saw the Marlies come back against the Hershey Bears, led by the clutch performance of Alex Nylander. They followed it up with a strong win against the San Jose Barracuda, only to fall short in the rematch.

Due to injuries and call-ups of young players, unsung heroes like Sam Stevens and Zach Solow stepped up, while goalkeepers Dennis Hildeby and Artur Akhtyamov kept their team in every game. Here's how the week went and what's next for a determined Marlies team.

First game: Marlies 4, Hershey Bears 3 (OT)

The Marlies had their game in overtime for a franchise-record fifth straight time. Hildeby allowed the first three goals of the game for the second time in a row and then settled down to shut down the opposition the rest of the way, allowing the Marlies to come back and tie the game. The last time that happened was last Saturday against the Belleville Senators when the game went 12 rounds before the Senators won the game when the 24th shooter passed Hildeby. The Marlies took the lead this time when Nylander sent Nick Abruzzese alone past Hershey goaltender Hunter Shepard 47 seconds into overtime. Abruzzese hit Shepard with a gloved hand on the wrist to complete the comeback.

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Goals by Mike Sgarbossa, Brennan Saulnier, and Luke Philp in the first half gave the Bears a 3-0 lead and they were rolling over the Marlies. At that point it became apparent that without Alex Steeves, Fraser Minton, and Nikita Grebenkin on the roster, as well as Cedric Pare and Joseph Blandisi injured, the Marlies would be no match for the two-time defending AHL champions. They seemed disappointed in their end, and the score was 3-0 in the first 14 minutes of the second half. With 5:18 left in the second period, Solow tipped Sam Stevens' foul shot past Shepard to give Toronto life.

Then, with seven seconds left in the period, the Marlies dropped the puck in the Hershey zone on a seemingly harmless play. Three Bears players lazily converged on the puck, perhaps thinking they would kill the clock to run out the clock. Braeden Kressler had other ideas as he took on Ethan Bear. The Bear tried to get the puck off the boards and out of the zone, but it came off Roni Hirvonen's skate and straight to Nylander. Before Shepard could react, Nylander scooped the puck past him in the net with 1.3 seconds left on the clock.

That gave the Marlies renewed life. They came out of the third and continued to press in search of an equalizing goal. The Bears did a great job of stopping the Marlies offense, as Toronto managed only five real shots on net in that span. Henrik Rybinski's reverse penalty midway through the period was the Bears' undoing. With just three seconds left on the man advantage, Nylander's attempted shot from the top of the faceoff circle to Shepard's right found the twine. Solow and Jacob Quillan made life difficult for Shepard, preventing him from seeing the puck before it was too late.

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With Steeves, Minten, and Grebenkin all with the Maple Leafs, the Marlies needed Nylander to step up and put the team on his back, and he did so by scoring two goals, including the tying goal, to put the Abruzzese in the lead. . Solow, a healthy scratch for most of this season, added a goal and an assist. Despite giving up three goals in his last three games and allowing Toronto to go down 3-0 in his last two games, Hildeby is undefeated in the AHL this season as he improved his record to 2-0-2 in four games. it starts.

Game 2: Marlies 3, San Jose Barracuda 0

The AHL has 32 teams across North America. It is a continental league. However, unlike the NHL, teams don't go to the beach all the time. They play most of their games against their closest local rivals. Teams don't have the money to fly their players all over Canada and the USA. Most teams arrive by bus for their out-of-town games. You also won't see an Eastern team playing a West Coast team very often. The Marlies already host the San Diego Gulls in two games to start the season. Now, for the first time in franchise history, they were set to host the San Jose Barracuda.

Fortunately for Nylander but unfortunately for the Marlies, he joined Steeves, Minton, and Grebenkin with the big league thanks to his performance and other injuries to the Maple Leafs. That left the Marlies to dig into Toronto's ECHL affiliate the Cincinnati Cyclones for reinforcements.

As you'd expect, with the two teams playing each other for the first time, this was a slow-paced, tight-knit game for the most part. The two groups seemed to get along. After a good start, the Marlies slowly took over the game as the first half wore on. Stevens, 24, a Montreal native who signed as an unrestricted free agent out of Boston College in the offseason, scored his first AHL goal to give the Marlies a 1-0 lead at 14:28 of the first period. Stevens scored his rebound after a pass from Logan Shaw while fighting for the ice in front of San Jose goalie Georgi Romanov.

The second half started much like the first, with neither team gaining much in attack. But again, the Marlies slowly took over the game as time went on. At 10:33 of the period, Hirvonen bent a pass from Abruzzese through Romanov's legs and into the net to give Toronto a 2-0 lead. Shots after two periods were 27-15 Marlies.

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The Barracuda put pressure on the board midway through the third period. Still, the Marlies played well defensively, and starter Akhtyamov made the save he needed to secure his second shutout. After San Jose pulled its goalie with three minutes left in the third period and the Barracuda were buzzing the Marlies end of the ice, Quillan got his stick on the puck and sent Ryan Tverberg alone. Tverberg put the puck into the empty cage to make it 3-0.

Akhtyamov had a stellar debut in North American Hockey, raising his record to 6-0-1 in seven starts with a .935 save percentage and a 1.65 goals against average.

Game 3: San Jose Barracuda 2, Marlies 1 (SO)

For the sixth time in seven games, the Marlies went overtime. This game was more fast-paced than Saturday's, but neither team was able to score more points on offense. After 30 minutes of play, the score was 11-8 San Jose.

As the second half drew to a close, Barracuda goalkeeper Gabriel Carriere stopped one shot from Abruzzese but was unable to control the rebound. Stevens put it past Carriere to put the Marlies up 1-0 with just seven seconds left on the clock.

The game broke open in the third as San Jose pressed to tie the game while the Marlies tried to score an insurance goal. The Barracuda scored at 9:40 when Danil Gushchin caught Marlies goaltender Matt Murray by surprise with a fake shot from a few feet from the goal line on the boards to Murray's left. The TV cameras failed to show how the puck got to Murray, but it did. Murray gave up just one goal in 65 minutes of action; we're sure he'd love to find that out.

After regulation ended at 1-1 and overtime didn't resolve anything, the game went to shootouts. Unlike the Marlies' last shootout, which took 24 attempts to complete, this one ended quickly. Kressler and Shaw missed in their attempts, while the Barracuda's Gushchin and Andrew Poturalski hit in theirs to beat San Jose.

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Steven made good use of the opportunity and finally entered the list with two goals and an assist in three games. Abruzzese (1G, 2A), Nylander (2G,1A), and Cade Webber (3A) all had three-point weeks. Webber had just one assist in his first 12 games with the Marlies before collecting three assists in those three games. Hirvonen was the only player to score more than a point, as he had a goal and an assist.

What's Next for the Couple?

With only one loss in 16 games, the Marlies are tied for second in the North Division with the Cleveland Monsters with 25 points, two behind the division-leading Laval Rocket. Toronto has a game in hand for both teams. They play their next three games on the road against both teams, one in Cleveland and two in Laval.

In an odd part of the AHL schedule, the Marlies play just one game this weekend: Friday night in Cleveland. They don't play again until Friday, December 6, and Saturday, December 7, in Laval.

[Note: I want to thank long-time Maple Leafs fan Stan Smith for collaborating with me on this post. Stan’s Facebook profile can be found here.]