TORONTO – William Nylander got the Maple Leafs off to a flying start in the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
The team will now wait for word on one of its key pieces.
Nylander scored twice in the first period before adding an assist as Toronto built a big lead early before hanging on late to down Florida 5-4 and take Game 1 on Monday night.
The Leafs lost goaltender Anthony Stolarz in the second period after he took an elbow to the head from Panthers forward Sam Bennett, who wasn’t penalized on the play.
The netminder stayed in his crease for a few minutes against the defending champs — Toronto stretched its lead to 4-1 — but was seen vomiting on the bench during a TV timeout before exiting.
The Leafs said the 31-year-old was being evaluated, but provided no further update.
“Elbow to the head,” Leafs head coach Craig Berube said. “Clear as day.”
“I get it, they miss calls,” he added. “But it’s clearly a penalty.”
Florida opposite Paul Maurice, who had Stolarz last season when he backed up Sergei Bobrovsky on the way to the franchise’s first title, said the referee was “standing right there” and didn’t deem the sequence an infraction.
“He saw it,” Maurice said. “(I’m) hopeful for Anthony and his health. We love that guy and we hope he gets better real fast.”
Matthew Knies and Chris Tanev, with a goal and an assist each, and Morgan Rielly provided the rest of the offence for the Leafs. Stolarz made eight saves before he departed.
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Joseph Woll stopped 17 shots in relief. Max Pacioretty and Jake McCabe added two assists apiece to open the teams’ best-of-seven series.
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“We’ve been in tight games throughout the season,” Nylander said. “We dug into that and tried to bear down.”
Bennett, Seth Jones, Eetu Luostarinen and Uvis Balinskis replied for the Panthers. Bobrovsky stopped 24 shots. Brad Marchand and Carter Verhaeghe had two assists each.
“There’s no surprises here,” said captain Aleksander Barkov, whose team trailed 3-1 after 20 minutes. “They came out a little better than us. But we did some good things.”
Florida, which will have suspended defenceman Aaron Ekblad available for Game 2 on Wednesday, beat Toronto in five at the same stage of the 2023 post-season on the way to making the Cup final. The Panthers went one step further 12 months later when they hoisted hockey’s holy grail.
Toronto opened Monday’s scoring inside a rocking rink just 33 seconds after puck drop when Nylander beat Bobrovsky through the five-hole for his fourth goal of the playoffs.
The Leafs, who beat the Ottawa Senators 4-2 in the first round to register just the second series win for the Original Six franchise in more than two decades, went up 2-0 at 12:51 when Nylander scooped up a Bobrovsky rebound before deking the goaltender to the ice and roofing his second of the period.
“He came out and was feeling it,” Rielly said of the slick winger. “That helps set the tone.”
Jones got the visitors on the board with a shot through traffic on a power play at 16:57 for his second after Toronto was whistled for too many men.
But the home side restored its two-goal lead just 19 seconds later when Nylander sent Rielly off to the races on a 2-on-1. The defenceman and longest serving member of the current roster looked Bobrovsky off before firing past the netminder’s blocker for his third.
Florida, which beat the Tampa Bay Lightning in five games to advance, got a man advantage in the second that saw Stolarz make a couple of stops, but Bennett caught him with that elbow.
“We knew coming into this game that they were gonna be physical, chippy,” Knies said.
Toronto made it 4-1 at 7:50 when Tanev’s knuckling shot from distance fooled Bobrovsky.
Stolarz was then caught by television cameras being sick by the bench a few minutes later before getting replaced by Woll.
“It’s a mix of concern for him and at the same time getting prepared to play,” said Woll, who last saw action April 17.
“Joe did a great job,” Tanev added. “That’s not an easy thing to do.”
Berube danced around the question when asked if Bennett should receive supplemental discipline from the NHL.
“Up to the league,” he said. “They’ll do what they think is necessary.”
Luostarinen cut the deficit back to two on a redirection 1:41 into the final period with his second. Balinskis then made it 4-3 at 4:30 inside a suddenly tense building.
Toronto failed to connect on two power plays later in the third before Knies made it 5-3 with six minutes left in regulation on a backhand breakaway move for his fourth.
Florida, however, wouldn’t go away.
Bennett got the Panthers back within one with 1:55 left in regulation on a pinballed shot off a Toronto stick for his fourth with Bobrovsky on the bench, but Woll and the Leafs held the fort late to secure an early lead in the series.
“That was nice for us,” Nylander said. “But we’re just focused on next game now.”
Along with the health of their No. 1 goaltender.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 5, 2025.
