'It still stings': Leafs' Matthews motivated by USA's heartbreaking loss
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The Maple Leafs (optional) and Carolina Hurricanes skated at Scotiabank Arena on Saturday.
Leafs centre Auston Matthews came so close to being the hero on Thursday night in the 4 Nations Face-Off championship game. After producing two primary assists in regulation, Team USA's captain fired three shots on net in overtime, but Team Canada goalie Jordan Binnington denied him each time.
Matthews then watched as a pass by Toronto teammate Mitch Marner went just inches past his stick and found Connor McDavid in the slot. McDavid's shot beat Connor Hellebuyck to give Canada another best-on-best title.
"It's tough," Matthews said. "It means a lot to wear that jersey and have the opportunity, and you never know how many chances you get at representing your country and playing in a tournament like that. It definitely still stings, but you got to flip the page here. It's a pretty quick turnaround."
Matthews and Marner will be in the lineup on Saturday night as the Leafs resume their regular season schedule against the Carolina Hurricanes.
Will Matthews draw motivation from the painful defeat in Boston?
"Yeah, definitely," the 27-year-old said. "Definitely."
Matthews has been forced to digest his share of painful losses over the years. The Leafs are 0-6 in winner-take-all games in the Stanley Cup playoffs since drafting the Arizona native first overall in 2016.
Matthews has learned not to dwell on the defeats.
"That's part of life," Matthews said. "It's not always going to work out in your favour. You know, for me, like, it sucks, but there's nothing that I can do to fix that now. It's about trying to just get better and be better as we move forward here for this team."
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Matthews sat out Monday's game against Sweden, which was meaningless in the standings, to rest an upper-body issue that popped up during the tournament, but he never really considered taking a game off upon his return to the Leafs.
"All these guys have been off for two weeks now and we've been playing, so I think we might actually have a little bit of the advantage here in a sense," Matthews said. "Still being a little bit fatigued. Obviously, a lot of emotional games down the stretch there, but it's [been] at least 48 hours ago we were playing so hopefully you're not going to feel too out of place getting back on the ice tonight."
Marner, who produced a pair of primary assists on Thursday, is feeling both energized and fatigued.
"It was a taxing tournament," the 27-year-old winger said. "It was very intense. It was high emotion, especially that last game. So, yeah, a little bit of both for sure. Just try to get your bearings and get ready to go back to work here."
Hurricanes forward Seth Jarvis, who played for Canada on Thursday, and defenceman Jaccob Slavin, who suited up for Team USA, will also play on Saturday.
"With the pace and play and everything it will probably feel like a scrimmage for them maybe," said Carolina coach Rod Brind'Amour. "It's tough to go from that and then get right back in the mix of what's going on, but they're pros and they got a job to do and I'm sure they'll do it."
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Marner insists he didn't know 100 per cent that it was Matthews closing in on him prior to the overtime goal on Thursday night.
"It's kind of tough in that moment to see," he said. "I didn't know he was on the ice for sure. Just with how they're running their D-zone, I knew it was kind of a bit of a tough spot for their D-man and their centre in that spot to decide who was going to kind of challenge that."
In the immediate aftermath of the win, Marner said he hoped to draw confidence and belief from the result. On Saturday, he expanded on what he, specifically, will take away from being in that best-on-best environment.
"Just the positivity on our bench," he said. "The positivity in our locker room. No doubt in our locker room. Once you hear that, and when stuff like that gets said a lot, you know, you really start to believe everything. So, try to take that into this locker room."
Canada defeated the United States after losing to their rivals in a round-robin game in Montreal. Canada also rallied from down 2-1 in the championship game with Marner setting up Sam Bennett for the equalizer late in the second period.
"It's fun to celebrate with everyone and then obviously flipped the switch pretty quickly," Marner said. "You know, getting on a plane, coming back here and getting ready for a game."
Marner and Matthews travelled back to Toronto together.
"We were just talking about the tournament, how much fun it was, but how taxing it was also on the body," Marner said. "It was pretty high-level competition. We just enjoyed the tournament. We talked about how much fun it was. Talked about looking forward to getting back to here and trying to take on bigger things now."
The pair made a conscious decision to avoid communication during the tournament. So, they had plenty to catch up on.
"We have a great relationship," Matthews said. "He's a close friend. So, you know, it's nice. Obviously not the way we [USA] wanted it to end, but, you know, it was just cool to catch up, be together again, spend some time. Obviously the focus now turns to this, back to this regular season and the last couple months."
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Matthews finished the 4 Nations Face-Off with three assists in three games. He posted six assists in his last six games with the Leafs. However, the three-time Rocket Richard Trophy winner hasn't scored since Jan. 22.
Breaking through on Saturday will not be easy as Matthews will likely see plenty of Slavin.
"I always knew how good he was defensively, but seeing him up close and personal and having him, you know, playing on the same team, I mean, he's, in my opinion, the best defensive defenceman in the league," Matthews raved. "Like, I've never seen a stick like his. I mean, the amount of plays he breaks up, shots that he blocks, and still able to make great passes out of [the] D-zone, and just the amount of ice that he covers is pretty incredible."
Slavin averaged 23 minutes and 16 seconds of ice time at the 4 Nations Face-Off and finished plus-three despite being matched up against top lines.
"I'm sure if he was in this market it'd be insane with how much media attention and love he would get," Marner said. "He does so much on the ice with his stick work, his body work, just taking away shot lanes, taking away passing lanes, making it very hard to get through him. It's always a challenge going against him. You gotta just try to be a step ahead of him and that's always hard to do."
Slavin tends to fly under the radar not only because he plays in a smaller market, but because the 30-year-old also doesn't produce flashy offensive numbers. With 20 points this season, Slavin was tied for 60th among NHL defencemen heading into Saturday's slate of games.
Slavin did not produce a point at the 4 Nations event, but got plenty of attention for his shutdown efforts.
"They couldn't stop talking about him," Brind'Amour said with a smile. "It was great. It's good for those kind of players too that maybe aren't the guys who are scoring all the big goals all the time. But is defending a goal as important? I don't know, ask yourself that. We know it is. So, maybe now we can look at it a little differently. There's other guys in the league that do similar things. He's an elite player in his own right, it's just a little different."
Slavin blocked three shots on Thursday, including a sliding stop on Jarvis.
"I hate him," Jarvis muttered with a grin when asked about playing his pal. "I see it every night. I'm really glad the rest of the hockey world got to see what he does. He did it at the highest level and shut down everybody. He maybe could have taken a pass on me.I had a chance, but he did what he does best and defended. He's an incredible, incredible talent. I'm just happy the rest of the hockey world finally got to witness it."
Is Slavin happy to finally be getting his due?
"In a sense, yes," he said. "But with my mentality and just the foundation of who I am, a man of faith, all the glory goes to God. I'm just thankful for the opportunity to use the gifts and abilities he's given me on a world stage. Whether people recognize me [or not], hopefully they just see Christ's light shining through me."
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It was also a coming-out party for Jarvis, who was Canada's youngest player when the initial roster was named. (Injury replacement Thomas Harley is a few months younger.)
What did Jarvis feel when McDavid scored on Thursday night?
"It was pure excitement," the 23-year-old said. "I felt like a little kid again. You can't even explain it."
After their flight to Boston got cancelled, Jarvis' pals from his hometown of Winnipeg made the 30-hour drive to witness the moment in person. The long road trip earned the crew some attention from reporters.
"They were loving the media attention," Jarvis said. "When the room caught wind of it, the guys wanted to meet them so they got to come down and meet a lot of the players. It was just incredible I could experience that with all the guys I grew up with ... a moment we'll all remember for a long time."
Jarvis was still buzzing on Saturday morning.
"A lot of confidence for me," he said. "Being surrounded by those guys and knowing you can compete and play in games like that and have an impact was a lot of fun for me and grows a lot of confidence in my game, especially for the rest of this year."
Brind'Amour believes that Jarvis' performance will put him in a good position to make Canada's Olympic team next year.
"I asked him, 'What were your takeaways? What are you taking away from that?' And he's got a lot," Brind'Amour said. "You start realizing your game maybe is not as far off as some of these top, top guys. I think just being around it is great for him and that's what that experience is for, not only winning and all that, that's a bonus, but just being able to be around the greatest players, it's gotta rub off on you."
Jarvis struck up a fast friendship with Marner.
"Similar personalities," Jarvis said. "We both like having fun, being light-hearted, and he just keeps everyone kind off laughing and in a good mood and that's all I want ... It was fun just to be around him and seeing him play is something special."
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Anthony Stolarz spent the 4 Nations break at home in New Jersey catching up with friends and family.
"Just kind of hanging out, but eager to get back and get going since I had a seven-week break," he said.
Stolarz returned from a knee injury right before the break, stopping 26 of 27 shots to pick up a win in Seattle on Feb. 6.
"It was important to get a game," he said. "It was good to get that one game in there and go out there and show you're back and you can do it again and get that game feel."
"He's had a lot of time off," coach Craig Berube said. "I want to get him back in there, and we got back-to-back games so they both can play."
Joseph Woll will start on Sunday in Chicago.
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The Leafs have dropped five straight games (0-4-1) to the Hurricanes, which is their longest active losing streak against a single opponent. Carolina beat Toronto 6-3 on Jan. 9 in Raleigh in the first meeting of the season between the teams.
"We shot ourselves in the foot in that game," Berube recalled. "We played a good first period and did some real good things, but they come at you. They're a pressure team. We all know that. They're in your face. They don't give you a lot of room, and I thought in the second period they took the game over. So we've got to handle that pressure better, and simplify our game. We didn't simplify enough in the second period, and we ended up playing too much in our end and did some things that were uncharacteristic of our team just from their pressure. So you've got to handle the pressure. They're going to come at you. They're a very aggressive team, and they don't give you a lot of time and space out there."
Matthews and Marner both finished a career worst minus-six in that previous game against Carolina.
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Saturday's game between the Leafs and Hurricanes falls on the five-year anniversary of the David Ayres Game.
"I got reminded of that yesterday," Brind'Amour said. "My initial thought was, five years, really, like, already. You know, time flies."
On Feb. 22, 2020, the Hurricanes saw goalies Petr Mrazek and James Reimer get injured leading to Ayres, the 42-year-old emergency back-up goalie, getting in the game in the second period.
Ayres stopped eight of 10 shots to become the first emergency goalie in NHL history to pick up a win.
"That was a great moment for our organization, for our team," Brind'Amour said. "It was one of those memories that you stack, and on days like this you remember that that was a pretty cool moment. You look back and that was an interesting game for everybody. It is what it is and you're moving on."
Pyotr Kochetkov gets the start for the Hurricanes on Saturday. Frederik Andersen, who took the loss for the Leafs five years ago, will be the back-up goalie.
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Max Pacioretty will miss the games this weekend after tweaking something earlier this week. Alex Steeves draws into the Leafs lineup on Saturday.
Connor Dewar is close to returning from an upper-body injury and may play on Sunday, per Berube.
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Projected Leafs lineup for Saturday's game:
Knies - Matthews - Marner
McMann - Tavares - Nylander
Domi - Holmberg - Robertson
Lorentz - Kampf - Steeves
McCabe - Tanev
Rielly - Ekman-Larsson
Benoit - Timmins
Stolarz starts
Woll