TORONTO (AP) — William Nylander had a goal and two assists in his return from an injury, Joseph Woll made 29 saves for his second shutout of the season and the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Vancouver Canucks 5-0 on Saturday night.
Nylander missed six games because of a lower-body injury.
Matias Maccelli, Max Domi, John Tavares and Nick Robertson also scored for Toronto. The Maple Leafs improved to 22-15-7. They have won three straight and seven in a row at home.
Thatcher Demko was pulled after giving up three first-period goals on six shots for Vancouver. Kevin Lankinen stopped 16 shots in relief as the Canucks dropped to 16-23-5 with their sixth loss in a row.
Maccelli opened the scoring on the Maple Leafs’ second shot 8:03 into the first period. Nylander and Auston Matthews had a give-and-go before Nylander sent a centering pass in front for Maccelli to tip in.
Domi scored with 3:29 left after being sprung ahead into a partial breakaway by Troy Stecher.
A streaking Nylander skated around Marcus Pettersson off a feed from Steven Lorentz and tucked in a backhander just out of the reach of Demko’s stretched out leg with 20 seconds left in the first.
Nylander found Tavares all alone behind Vancouver’s defense and Tavares roofed it past Lankinen with 6:53 left in the second period. Robertson scored on a power play with 13.4 seconds left in the third.
Up next
Canucks: At Montreal on Monday night.
Maple Leafs: At Colorado on Monday night.
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AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/nhl
