TORONTO – Tristan Jarry made 26 saves for his second consecutive shutout as the Pittsburgh Penguins beat Toronto 2-0 on Saturday to break the Maple Leafs’ five-game winning streak.
Jake Guentzel and Jeff Carter scored for Pittsburgh (7-6-4).
Jack Campbell stopped 29 shots for Toronto (12-6-1), which had won 10 of its last 11 games coming into play.
The Penguins, who have grappled with a COVID-19 outbreak and a number of key injuries, including those to star centers Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, won back-to-back games for the first time in 2021-22 following Thursday’s 6-7 win. 0 over the Montreal Canadiens.
The Leafs prepared for their 13th home game of the season, the NHL’s highest, and will now hit the road for six of the next seven starting Sunday at the New York Islanders’ new UBS Arena before go through California.
Toronto suffered by far its worst loss of the season on October 23 at Pittsburgh – a 7-1 demolition by the severely understaffed Penguins. But the club under fire responded with a better effort two nights later in Carolina despite falling 4-1 to the Hurricanes to set the stage for that 10-game win streak.
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After the Leafs’ Mitch Marner fired a shot off Jarry’s crossbar on Saturday, the visitors opened the scoring at 5:46 in the first period. Guentzel moved to the slot after the race, went over Toronto defender Rasmus Sandin and then backhanded his seventh goal of the season over Campbell.
Given another shot at the top line for the Leafs despite recording just two assists in 18 games, Nick Ritchie came close to bagging his first in blue and white later in the period with a deft drive from Marner, but Jarry was there to. close the door.
Pittsburgh then made it 2-0 at 5:15 p.m. with a goal that seemed to materialize out of nowhere.
Former Toronto winger Kasperi Kapanen, who played his first game in Toronto since he was returned to the Penguins in August 2020, hit the puck in the offensive zone from center. Jason Zucker edged out Leafs blue line player Justin Holl and slipped a pass off Carter, who positioned himself in front of Jake Muzzin to score his fourth on a defenseless Campbell.
The home team and their red-hot power play, which came with 10 goals in the last 10 games, had a chance in the middle of the second, but William Nylander found iron in the Leafs’ best chance.
Campbell, the NHL leader in save percentage and goals-against average, kept the deficit at 2-0 late in the period when he made a good save over Guentzel.
The Toronto keeper had to be sharp again twice for Brock McGinn before Pierre Engvall hit the Leafs’ third post at the other end.
After Campbell denied Kapanen another good chance, the Leafs got their second power play, but there was nothing they could do.
Jarry made a nice save from the slot over Wayne Simmonds with less than six minutes left in regulation time when the Leafs finally started pushing and got a 5-on-3 power for 1:49.
But Toronto once again couldn’t find a way to get past Jarry, who was rescued by another crossbar in a Nylander effort as the Penguins posted their second straight win.
Crosby, who missed the start of the schedule due to off-season wrist surgery before testing positive for COVID-19, played only his fifth game on the schedule after scoring his first goal of the season on Thursday.
Notes: Saturday marked two years since Sheldon Keefe replaced Mike Babcock as the Leafs head coach. … Malkin (knee surgery) has yet to play this season. … Kapanen was originally traded to the Leafs for the Penguins on July 1, 2015, as part of the Phil Kessel deal. The 25-year-old scored 49 goals and 90 points in 202 regular-season games in parts of five seasons with Toronto. … Pittsburgh visits the Winnipeg Jets on Monday.
This Canadian Press report was first published on November 20, 2021.
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Reference-globalnews.ca