Leafs Snap Losing Streak With Late Goal

The Leafs almost lost four in a row. Almost.

As it has been so many times for Toronto this season, the Buds seemed destined to take a winnable game and turn it into a loss in the column marked “L.”

Not this time.

On Tuesday night, the Leafs snapped a three-game losing streak with a 4-3 win over the Minnesota Wild, and they owed a great deal of it to a timely effort from Jeff O’Neill.

It was the veteran forward that pounced on a late rebound and put away the winning goal as the clock ticked down under three minutes.

When the puck whipped over the left shoulder of Minnesota keeper Manny Fernandez and bulged the twine in the top of the Wild net, there was a palpable feeling of relief, not only for the Leafs and their coaching staff, but also for the the crowd at the Air Canada Centre, which has often seen things not go their way.

But this was a win the Leafs earned, spending much of the game’s latter stages in control and threatening on offence. Still, until they went ahead, almost nobody believed it would actually happen.

Toronto’s other goals came from Mats Sundin, Alex Steen and John Pohl, who was awarded a penalty shot in the second and made good. Sundin’s goal was his 1,200th career point.

The visiting Wild’s tallies came from Kurtis Foster, Wes Walz and Brian Rolston.

Minnesota got the better of the goaltender battle, with Manny Fernandez facing a barrage of quality Leafs chances late and for the most part turning them aside while making a total of 32 saves. Andrew Raycroft wasn’t exactly stellar in the Leafs net, but did manage to stop 17 shots, which on this night was enough.

But a one-game win streak won’t be anywhere near enough and the Leafs will need to start thinking about putting together consecutive victories if they’re at all serious about being a playoff team come spring.

They’ll have a day to think about that, as the team doesn’t play again until Thursday when it visits Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins.

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