Paltry offence continues to let down Maple Leafs in loss to Wild

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A goal a game isn’t cutting it for the Maple Leafs.

In their last home game before the break for the 4 Nations Face-Off, the Leafs’ offensive production came up small again in a 3-1 loss against the Minnesota Wild at Scotiabank Arena.

The loss on Wednesday night was the Leafs’ third in a row. Toronto, which heads west on Thursday for a four-game trip before the break, has scored just one goal in each.

The victory was the Wild’s 19th on the road, the most in the NHL in 2024-25.

Toronto, which doesn’t play at home again until Feb. 22 versus Carolina, avoided being shut out for the fourth time this season when William Nylander scored his 29th at 8:16 of the third period.

Nylander drove to the net and deposited a pass from Pontus Holmberg behind Wild netminder Filip Gustavsson.

Joseph Woll stopped 22 shots in the Leafs net. Gustavsson made 31 saves for the Wild.

Marcus Foligno scored into an empty Leafs net with 15 seconds remaining.

The Wild scored the only goals it required to win in the first 16 minutes of the game. Each included a bad look for a couple of high-profile Leafs.

Before the first goal, defenceman Morgan Rielly put up little resistance behind the Toronto net, losing a battle for the puck with Wild forward Jakub Lauko. The latter centred to Marat Khusnutdinov, who snapped the puck past an unprepared Woll at 7:07.

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With David Kampf serving a tripping minor, the Wild scored on the power play at 15:35, just five seconds after the penalty started.

Captain Auston Matthews lost the draw in the defensive zone to Joel Eriksson Ek and moved to the slot, where he accidentally deflected a shot by Wild defenceman Jared Spurgeon. The puck bounced off the ice and past Woll.

Matthews hit the post not long after. In the second period, Nylander raced off to another of his many breakaways and beat Gustavsson, but the shot rang off the post.

Max Domi had what appeared to be a good chance in the first, but he chose to pass to Nylander rather than use his good shot. The Wild broke up the play.

The Wild entered the game with the third-worst penalty kill in the NHL and had given up eight power-play goals on 20 chances in the last seven games, but that didn’t factor into the outcome. The Leafs had just one power play, which was early in the second period, but failed to score.

tkoshan@postmedia.com

X: @koshtorontosun