Less than a minute later, Marner made an ill-fated pass to Matthews at the Toronto blue line. Nylander, having blown a tire near the Maple Leafs blue line, was lying on the ice when Barkov snapped a shot past Ilya Samsonov to tie the game. Of most concern: The architects of Toronto's demise included forwards William Nylander, Mitchell Marner and Auston Matthews, the core forwards who went through six consecutive series losses in six years before helping to defeat Tampa Bay in the first round. No longer would they be haunted by past failures.Įxcept now, the Maple Leafs must deal with a new horror, all 66 seconds of it.

Overcoming that hurdle was supposed to be the mental boost the Maple Leafs needed. 'We didn't make those mistakes one time in the last series.'Ī series Toronto won in six games against the Tampa Bay Lightning for its first playoff series victory since 2004. When it was all over, Keefe looked disheartened, to say the least, when asked what happened in the period's early moments.

With the Maple Leafs leading 2-1 coming out of the intermission, a series of self-inflicted hiccups allowed Panthers center Aleksander Barkov to tie the game 19 seconds into the second before defenseman Gustav Forsling put Florida ahead 3-2 just 47 seconds after that. So after losing the first two games of this series at home, a season of hope, promise and optimism may have been erased by a disastrous 66-second span to start the second period.

The reality of the situation is that both Dubas, the general manager, and Keefe, the coach, understand the Maple Leafs' Stanley Cup dreams just became that much more difficult of a journey. Toronto trails 2-0 in the best-of-7 series, which shifts to FLA Live Arena in Sunrise, Florida, for Game 3 on Sunday (6:30 p.m. Sheldon Keefe equally was perturbed after the Maple Leafs lost 3-2 to the Florida Panthers in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Second Round at Scotiabank Arena. He wasn't the only one who felt that way.

The Message Game by Ice White