The Toronto Maple Leafs are heading deeper into their Western road swing with a little more bite in their game and a lot more confidence than they had a week ago. A rough opening stretch has given way to four straight wins, and the latest one - a 7-2 dismantling of the Edmonton Oilers on Oct. 24 - was the clearest sign yet that this revamped roster can spread the offence around.
That matters, because Toronto still has work to do on the injury front. The club is trying to keep its footing without John Tavares and Chris Tanev, while also managing a growing list of blue-line absences. But for now, the Leafs have done what good teams do when the lineup gets messy: they’ve found production from all over and kept stacking results.
As of Oct. 25, Toronto is 7-4-2 and sitting on 16 points through 13 games.
The wins have come against the Columbus Blue Jackets, New York Rangers and Oilers during the four-game run, and the surge has come with a different look than the early part of the season. Auston Matthews is still driving the attack, William Nylander is rolling, and the supporting cast has chipped in enough to make the offence feel more dangerous from top to bottom.
Nylander’s night against Edmonton summed up the stretch nicely. He scored twice, including the 300th goal of his NHL career, while Matthews also scored.
Jack Roslovic has added to the mix as well, scoring against his former team in consecutive games. Easton Cowan has been part of the story too, giving Toronto another source of energy and offensive creativity.
That depth has been one of the biggest positives over the past week. The Leafs’ power play has scored in each of the last four games, and the bottom six has started to contribute more regularly. When opponents can’t just key on Matthews and Nylander, Toronto becomes a much harder team to manage.
There’s also been a goaltending boost. Anthony Stolarz stopped 30 shots against Edmonton and improved to 4-1-0, while Sergei Bobrovsky picked up a win against the Rangers earlier in the week. With a tougher travel stretch ahead, that kind of tandem stability gives head coach Jim Hiller some breathing room.
The biggest issue remains the injury file. Tavares is on injured reserve with a lower-body injury, taking an experienced centre out of the lineup at a time when Toronto is still sorting out its rhythm.
Tanev is out with an upper-body injury and was described as week-to-week, making his status one to watch. The Leafs also called up Dakota Mermis and Cole McWard from the AHL’s Toronto Marlies on Friday after placing Nick Blankenburg and Marshall Rifai on Injured Reserve.
Toronto’s current four-game road trip still has three stops left, and the next few days will show whether this run can become something sturdier than a hot streak. All times are Eastern.
Monday, Oct. 26: at Calgary Flames, 8:30 p.m.
Wednesday, Oct. 28: at Seattle Kraken, 10:00 p.m.
Saturday, Oct. 31: at Vancouver Canucks, 7:00 p.m.
The Leafs have already shown they can light up the scoreboard. The next step is doing it while the road gets longer, the schedule gets tighter and the margin for error gets smaller.
In Other News...
Oilers Suddenly Have Questions Their Record Was Hiding
The record still looked shiny, but the performance in Toronto did not. Edmonton was hammered 7-2 by the Maple Leafs, taking its second regulation loss of the season and exposing some early cracks in a start that had largely masked those issues. Leon Draisaitl scored twice to keep the Oilers from being completely swallowed up, but the night also featured goals from former Oilers Jack Roslovic and Troy Stecher, a reminder of how quickly a game can tilt when the margins are thin.
The bigger concern was how little resistance Edmonton offered in its own end, especially with defensive breakdowns piling up and certain line combinations struggling to find their footing. Tristan Jarry had a rough night in net as Toronto kept finding space and finishing chances, leaving the Oilers with more questions than answers as they try to sort out whether this was just one bad result or the first clear sign that their early success needs a closer look. [Read more 🡒]
Former Oiler Jack Roslovic Is Suddenly Becoming A Problem In Toronto
Jack Roslovic did not linger long in Edmonton, but his next stop has quickly turned him into a nuisance for the Oilers' fan base from afar. Since landing with the Toronto Maple Leafs, the former Oiler has piled up 10 points in 12 games, a sharp enough burst to make his early run in Toronto look like more than a hot streak. Roslovic has also pointed back to his time with Edmonton as part of the reason his approach has sharpened, crediting what he learned there with helping him settle into a better daily standard.
For Edmonton, the bigger picture only gets more complicated because Connor McDavid keeps operating at another level entirely, sitting on 31 points in 10 games and threatening one of those seasons that gets talked about for years. And while Roslovic's form in Toronto is the immediate sting, the broader conversation around player movement is also getting louder, with some NHL players privately believing teams should have more control when trade requests enter the picture. It is the kind of debate that only gets louder when a former Oiler starts producing for a rival and reminding everyone how thin the line can be between a departure and a regret. [Read more 🡒]
Babcock Just Called Out What Really Doomed The Oilers Against Toronto
The Oilers 7-2 loss to the Maple Leafs was the kind of night that leaves little room for soft explanations. Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl and Evan Bouchard all chipped in offensively, but Edmonton was still buried by Torontos pace, structure and edge, with the defensive side of the puck never finding a foothold. Tristan Jarry got the start in goal and gave up six, adding to a game in which the Oilers simply could not keep up.
What stood out afterward was not just the margin, but the familiar frustration around the effort level. Mike Babcock took aim at the teams compete, saying the standard against a team like Toronto should have been obvious from the opening puck drop. For an Edmonton group trying to establish consistency, the concern is less about one ugly result than whether this was an isolated lapse or another reminder of how quickly things unravel when the urgency disappears. [Read more 🡒]