With Matthews out again, William Nylander's scoring touch even more vital for Maple Leafs

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Auston Matthews likely won’t repeat as the Rocket Richard Trophy winner, but how about him passing it off to another Maple Leaf?

The succession of a teammate as goals leader has happened in only eight of the National Hockey League’s 106 seasons, almost all during the firewagon era of the Montreal Canadiens. But Toronto?

Before Matthews won the Richard three of the past four years, scoring 69 goals last season, only six Leafs/St. Patricks ever held the title, none since Gaye Stewart netted 37 in 50 games in ’46-47. Franchise greats Babe Dye and Charlie Conacher often repeated as goals leaders but were never followed by a teammate.

That brings us to William Nylander’s hot streak, which continued Saturday in the first game of what could be another lengthy Matthews absence. That gave Nylander five in his past three starts, eight this month and 17 since Halloween. His total of 23 was one behind Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl before the Oilers hosted the Ottawa Senators on Sunday evening.

“I know Leon had 23 (before adding another Saturday against San Jose),” Nylander said. “But that’s not what I’m thinking about.”

Meaning, were Nylander to match or exceed 40 goals, his career-high of the past two seasons, it’s more about how that tops up the missing offence of Matthews and helps the Leafs make a first-place push in the New Year.

Matthews is not expected to play in Monday’s 2 p.m. matinee against the Winnipeg Jets at Scotiabank Arena. Head coach Craig Berube hinted that it’s best if the Leafs use the coming three-day Christmas break to take another assessment of the captain’s upper-body injury that has already held him out of 10 games.

Saturday’s 6-3 loss to the Islanders was a result that proved the Leafs can’t keep living on their laurels when Matthews is out, even if their record is an impressive 42-22-2 whenever he’s missing, 7-3 this season. They need another game-breaker when clubs such as the Islanders get off to an early lead and apply the choke hold.

Nylander’s 21 minutes on Saturday, with seven shots on net — both club highs for forwards — was duly noted. He kept his feet moving all night and should have drawn at least one penalty in a game that strangely had none called.

“I thought he was skating (hard) early in the game, had good jump, wants the puck, wants to make things happen,” Berube said. “He’s motivated.”

Nylander’s vision spotted a narrow lane in the slot to get Toronto on the board, with a backhand goal of all things. His second goal was more unconventional for him, going to the net to take a pass in the slot from David Kampf and sliding a shot past Ilya Sorokin while being upended.

Berube can deploy Nylander on a loaded line with Matthews and Mitch Marner and when the roster is healthy, as a complement to physical forces John Tavares and Max Pacioretty.

Nylander also has seven of the team’s 20 power-play tallies.

His six-game points streak included Saturday’s fifth multi-goal effort of the year.

“It’s not just Willy, you need everybody to step up,” Berube said of plugging the Matthews hole.

While it could be that Matthews is eventually advised to sit out February’s 4 Nations Faceoff, if there is a health concern for the playoffs, Nylander is looking forward to the tournament for Team Sweden.

While not saying it yet, it would be exciting for him to pursue the magical 50-goal feat and keep himself in the Rocket conversation beyond February.

But it’s a crowded launch pad, with Draisaitl just ahead of him, Minnesota’s Kirill Kaprizov,  Brayden Point of Tampa Bay and Sam Reinhart of Florida all one behind him and four more at 19 (Mikko Rantanen and Kyle Connor) or 18 (Jake Guentzel and Mark Scheifele), as of Sunday evening.

Lhornby@postmedia.com 

X: @sunhornby 

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