The Nashville Predators got a fast start, built a three-goal cushion, and still walked out of Toronto empty-handed Tuesday night after the Maple Leafs rallied for a 5-4 overtime win.
Nashville’s first road game of the 2026-27 season looked promising almost immediately. The Predators struck first on an early power play after Maple Leafs defenseman Morgan Reilly was called for tripping Mavrik Bourque.
After sustained pressure in the offensive zone, Steven Stamkos finally broke through to make it 1-0. The goal also moved Stamkos up the NHL’s goal leaderboard, where he took sole possession of 17th with the 626th of his career.
The lead doubled quickly. Just 1:55 later, Nils Hoglander buried his second goal of the season to push Nashville ahead 2-0 before the first period was even halfway done.
Toronto had some pressure late in the penalty kill, but Nashville kept the Maple Leafs off the board on that first man advantage. Then the Predators stretched the lead to 3-0 on a hard-working sequence from Hoglander, who forced a turnover and stayed with the play after Filip Forsberg couldn’t finish in front.
The puck came back to Hoglander, and he put it past Anthony Stolarz. Mavrik Bourque picked up an assist, his first as a Predator.
Toronto finally got moving after that. John Tavares cut into the deficit with a shot from the faceoff dot that beat Juuse Saros and gave Gavin McKenna his first career point, an assist.
Soon after, Brandon Duhaime drew a hooking penalty on Jack Drury, and this time the Maple Leafs cashed in. Auston Matthews fired for a rebound that landed on William Nylander’s stick, and Nylander finished to pull Toronto within one.
A TV timeout came right after the goal, giving Andrew Brunette’s team a brief reset.
Nashville answered in the second period when Stamkos scored again at 13:30, this time at even strength for his first such goal of the season. But Toronto responded just one minute later, as McKenna scored his first career goal to make it a one-goal game again.
The Predators then had to survive another tense stretch after Ross Colton was penalized for cross-checking Jake McCabe. Their penalty kill held firm and kept Toronto from tying it.
In the third, the Maple Leafs kept pushing. About 7:30 into the period, Nick Paul and McKenna broke in on a 2-on-1, but Saros made a big stop on Paul to preserve Nashville’s 4-3 lead.
That save only delayed the inevitable. About 90 seconds later, Jack Roslovic scored to make it 4-4.
Nylander appeared to have given Toronto its first lead at 11:49 of the third, but Brunette challenged for offside. After the review, the goal was waved off and the game stayed tied.
Saros had to come up big again with just under four minutes left in regulation, denying Kirill Marchenko and sending the game to overtime.
In the extra period, Stamkos, Ryan O’Reilly, and Roman Josi started for Nashville. Stamkos got loose for an early shot, but Stolarz stopped it. The Predators controlled much of the play for a stretch, even forcing Maple Leafs defenseman Darren Raddysh to stay on the ice for nearly two minutes.
Still, Toronto nearly ended it on a 3-on-0 rush, only for Saros to somehow keep it out and keep Nashville alive. The Leafs finally finished the job with 14 seconds left in overtime, when Matthews beat Saros for the winner and sealed the 5-4 comeback.
In Other News...
Predators Ended Up On The Wrong Side Of Gavin McKenna's Breakout
The night belonged to a rookie milestone, even if it came at Nashvilles expense. Torontos Gavin McKenna picked up his first NHL point earlier in the game on a John Tavares goal, then kept building on the moment with the kind of debut-night impact that tends to linger long after the final horn. For the Predators, it was the sort of game where an opponents breakthrough becomes part of the backdrop to a result they would rather forget.
McKenna later added his first NHL goal against Juuse Saros late in the second period to trim Torontos deficit to one, completing a memorable breakthrough in front of a Nashville team trying to manage the game and the crowd shift that comes with it. The rookie became the youngest Maple Leaf to register his first point since 1990 and the ninth-youngest in franchise history to score his first NHL goal, a reminder that sometimes an opponents rough night is the start of someone elses arrival. [Read more 🡒]