Sunrise, Fla. – Auston Matthews got his first goal of the series to break a scoreless tie in the third period, Joseph Woll stopped 21 shots and the Toronto Maple Leafs kept their season alive by beating the Florida Panthers 2-0 in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference semifinal series Friday night.
Game 7 is Sunday night in Toronto. The winner will face Carolina in the East final.
Max Pacioretty added an insurance goal for the Maple Leafs, who improved to 4-2 when facing elimination since the start of the 2023 playoffs.
Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 15 shots for the Panthers, the defending Stanley Cup champions who oddly are only 8-7 in potential closeout games over the last three postseasons.
Florida coach Paul Maurice is 5-0 in Game 7s, including the final game of last season’s Stanley Cup Final. The Panthers are 3-1 in the ultimate game of a series – 2-0 on the road – while the Maple Leafs have lost each of their last six Game 7s. Of those, four were against Boston and now-Panthers forward Brad Marchand.
It was the 68th game of this season’s playoffs – and only the second that was 0-0 after 40 minutes. The other was Wednesday night, when Edmonton wound up eliminating Vegas with a 1-0 victory in overtime in Game 5 of that Western Conference semifinal series.
Toronto had five goals in Game 1, four more in Game 2 and had three by the early goings of the second period of Game 3. Add it up, and that was 12 in basically the first seven periods of the series.
From there, Toronto had managed basically nothing – until Matthews broke through.
The Toronto captain was 0 for 31 on shots against Florida this season, including the regular season. Bobrovsky had stopped 85 of the last 86 shot attempts he had seen in the series. And the Maple Leafs hadn’t had the lead in basically the equivalent of 3 1/2 games – 216 minutes, 30 seconds, to be precise.
But when a pass got away from Florida’s Aaron Ekblad, Matthews had a slight opening – and that was all he needed. A low shot skittered along the ice and beat Bobrovsky for a 1-0 lead with 13:40 left.
Former Detroit Red Wings forward Sam Gagner was named director of player development for the Ottawa Senators after completing his professional playing career.
The 35-year-old had 529 points (197 goals, 332 assists) in 1,043 games over 17 seasons with the Edmonton Oilers, Arizona Coyotes, Philadelphia Flyers, Columbus Blue Jackets, Vancouver Canucks, Red Wings and Winnipeg Jets.
In 129 games in Detroit from 2019-2022, Gagner had 21 goals and 47 points. He had four assists in 11 Stanley Cup Playoff games with the Flyers and Blue Jackets
Gagner had 10 assists in 19 games this season for Ottawa’s American Hockey League affiliate in Belleville. He was selected by the Oilers with the No. 6 pick in the 2007 NHL Draft.
“Sam had an incredible career as a player and we look forward to launching his next chapter,” Senators general manager Steve Staios said. “A true character individual, Sam has contributed to the success of his organizations, both on and off the ice.”
Philadelphia – The Philadelphia Flyers introduced Rick Tocchet as the 25th head coach in franchise history on Friday, bringing home a fan favorite and one of the NHL’s most respected hockey minds to guide the team through its critical next phase.
General manager Danny Brière made the announcement at a packed news conference at the Wells Fargo Center, calling the 61-year-old Tocchet the “long-term solution” for the franchise’s bench position. The deal reportedly for $25 million over five years signals a serious investment in the franchise’s future direction.
“This is a big day for the Flyers,” Brière said. “Rick is the kind of teacher and communicator we need. He was a mentor to me as a young player, and I know he’s going to do the same for our guys coming up. He’s the perfect fit.”
Tocchet returns to Philadelphia where he played parts of 11 seasons across two stints and became one of the franchise’s most beloved and gritty figures. He amassed 508 points and more than 1,800 penalty minutes in an orange and black jersey. He later won Stanley Cups as an assistant coach in Pittsburgh and rebuilt struggling squads in Tampa Bay, Arizona, and, most recently, Vancouver.
“Walking back into this city, this building – it’s emotional,” Tocchet said. “This fan base is one of a kind. The passion, the accountability, the heart – that’s what Flyers hockey is about, and that’s what I want this team to embody.”
The hiring comes as the Flyers continue a full-scale rebuild. Last season, under former coach John Tortorella, the team exceeded modest expectations with a scrappy, overachieving group but collapsed late in the season and missed the playoffs for a fifth straight year – leading to Tortorella’s firing.
With a strong prospect pipeline, ample draft capital and cap flexibility, Brière and president of hockey operations Keith Jones believe now is the time to lock in their leadership.
“The roster, the team, the potential, the prospect pool, the cap space that’s coming – there are a lot of positives for this job,” Tocchet said. “It’s an attractive job and it’s one of the best jobs in hockey.”
Tocchet’s coaching résumé has grown impressively since his early days behind the bench. He had assistant roles in Colorado and Pittsburgh, and was head coach in Tampa Bay during the late 2000s. But it was his work in Arizona from 2017–21 that earned league-wide respect.
“There were years in Arizona where most thought they’d finish dead last,” Brière noted. “But Rick had that team playing hard, structured hockey every night. He made them competitive with very little.”
After Arizona, Tocchet transitioned to a high-profile broadcast role with TNT before taking over behind the bench midseason in Vancouver in 2023. He guided a struggling Canucks team into playoff contention, eventually winning the Jack Adams Award in 2024 for NHL Coach of the Year.
His Vancouver tenure wasn’t without turbulence. Public spats with players like J.T. Miller drew headlines, but Tocchet downplayed those issues Thursday.
“Sometimes things don’t work out, and that’s life,” he said. “But I learned a lot. I’m proud of the job we did in Vancouver, and I’m better for it.”
Brière said he sought feedback from former Tocchet players and staff across the league.
“What kept coming up was how much players respect him, how he makes them feel heard,” Brière said. “He builds relationships. That matters.”
Tocchet inherits a Flyers roster flush with young talent. He cited Travis Sanheim and Travis Konecny – both of whom he coached during international tournaments – as examples of untapped potential.
“We’ve got some guys here who can take a big step,” Tocchet said. “It’s my job to get them there. That’s the job I love – helping players find another gear.”
He also made clear that he intends to shape the team’s culture. “Players today want trust, communication, safety,” Tocchet said. “It’s not a dictatorship. We’re in this together.”
Asked whether he believed this team could become a playoff contender again soon, Tocchet offered cautious optimism: “I love the direction we’re going. We’ve got the pieces. It’s my job to get the most out of them.”
The Flyers haven’t reached the postseason since 2020. Tocchet will now be tasked with not just building a winning team, but reconnecting it with a hungry fan base that remembers his blue-collar approach fondly.
Dallas – The Dallas Stars may just want to wrap up their second-round Western Conference series when they have a chance in Game 6, and not let Connor Hellebuyck and the Jets get another game in Winnipeg.
While the Stars have a 3-2 series lead and aren’t facing elimination Saturday night at home, a loss would send them quickly back to Winnipeg for a series-deciding game. That is where Hellebuyck has back-to-back shutouts and hasn’t allowed a goal to Dallas in more than 141 minutes on the ice since Mikko Rantanen’s hat trick in the second period of Game 1 that was enough for a 3-2 win.
“We felt like we needed to win this one. You don’t want to give them any life at all. We don’t want to come back here for Game 7,” Stars forward Matt Duchene said after their 4-0 loss Thursday night extended the series. “Obviously up 3-1 at one point, it might take seven. They’re a good enough team, it could.”
Hellebuyck and the Jets, however, have lost nine consecutive playoff road games since winning their postseason opener at Vegas in 2023, including Games 3 and 4 of this series in Dallas. The Presidents’ Trophy winner has been outscored 25-8 away from home in these playoffs.
“We’ve got to win a road game,” Jets captain Adam Lowry said. “We haven’t played well on the road at all this playoff, so no better time than now to start.”
The winner of this series, which will have home-ice advantage in the next round, advances to play a resting Edmonton team in the Western Conference Final. The Oilers wrapped up their second round-victory over Vegas with a 1-0 overtime win in Game 5 on Wednesday night.
Dallas is trying to reach the West final for the third season in a row, and lost in six games to Edmonton last year. Winnipeg’s last conference final was in 2018.
Stars captain Jamie Benn sucker-punched Winnipeg center Mark Scheifele during a late scrum in Game 5. Benn was given a misconduct penalty then, and on Friday was fined by the NHL the maximum-allowed $5,000, but avoided a suspension.
“My face hurts. There’s not much I can really say in this situation,” Scheifele said Friday before the Jets flew to Texas.
Scheifele got credited with the opening goal Thursday on a wrist shot that deflected off two Dallas players and past goaltender Jake Oettinger, who had 31 saves. The Jets had a two-man advantage after consecutive tripping periods early in the third period and went ahead 2-0 when Nikolaj Ehlers scored – he added a late empty-netter for his fifth goal in the series.
“They played with a desperation level like it was an elimination game. We’re a little bit off that,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer said.
Dallas has won five home games in a row since starting the postseason against Colorado with its eighth consecutive Game 1 loss – an unexplainable streak that finally ended with the Rantanen-led win to open this series. That was after his four-point third period with a hat trick in Game 7 against the Avalanche, his former team.
If the Stars do need another Game 7 on Monday night, they have won all three they have played under DeBoer over three seasons. He is the only coach or player in NHL history to be part of nine Game 7 victories, with four different teams, and hasn’t lost one.
Still, with a chance now to close out the series at home, Dallas would prefer not to have to play another one.
“We have to approach this like a Game 7, even though we have the luxury of it not being a Game 7,” DeBoer said.
The Jets, meanwhile, are trying to stave off elimination for the third time this postseason.
“It would mean that we’re not going on vacation yet,” Ehlers said. “We want to go to Dallas and win that game. … It’s been so special to play here in front of this crowd, and we want to repay them by coming back and playing a Game 7 here.”
St. Paul, Minn. – The Minnesota Wild signed center Danila Yurov, their 2022 first-round draft pick, to a three-year, entry-level contract on Friday.
Yurov has played in the KHL in his native Russia for the last five seasons for Metallurg Magnitogorsk, with 41 goals, 47 assists and a plus-41 rating over 209 career games. He had eight goals in 61 games in the playoffs, winning a Gagarin Cup championship with Metallurg last year.
Yurov, who won a silver medal with Russia at the world junior championship in 2021, was the 24th overall pick in the NHL draft in 2022. The 6-foot-1, 176-pound Yurov will have a prime opportunity to make the team at age 21 with a strong training camp next season, with the Wild’s center depth currently lacking behind Joel Eriksson Ek.
“Center’s a very difficult position to play as a young player. We’d like to see him there, see how he does and then we’ll go from there,” general manager Bill Guerin said. “Just like any other young player, defensively you really have to want to play a 200-foot game. That’s going to be really important for him, especially where our team’s at.”
Stockholm – Elias Lindholm scored a hat trick as Sweden blanked newcomer Slovenia 4-0 to keep a perfect record of five wins from five games at the ice hockey world championship on Friday.
Sweden has the sole lead of Group A with Canada in second three points behind and a game in hand against Slovakia on Saturday. Slovenia is eighth without a point.
Marcus Johansson also scored and goaltender Jacob Markstrom needed nine saves to shut out Slovenia.
Red Wings defenseman Erik Gustafsson had two assists and was plus-2 and Lucas Raymond had six shots and was plus-1 for Sweden.
In Herning, Switzerland shut out Norway 3-0 to move to the top of Group B, two points ahead of the defending champion Czech Republic in second.
Earlier, Austria beat France 5-2 for its second win in Stockholm.
Austria is fifth in Group A with five points, France remains seventh on one.
Red Wings forward Marco Kasper, Vinzenz Rohrer and Ramon Schnetzer each scored for Austria to jump 3-0 up, forcing France to substitute goalie Antoine Keller with Quentin Papillon with 4:30 to go in the first period in Stockholm.
London, Ontario – The judge handling the trial of five Canadian hockey players accused of sexual assault dismissed the jury Friday after a complaint that defense attorneys were laughing at some of the jurors.
Ontario Superior Court Justice Maria Carroccia will now handle the high-profile case on her own.
The issue arose Thursday after one of the jurors submitted a note indicating that several jury members felt they were being judged and laughed at by lawyers representing one of the accused as they came into the courtroom each day. The lawyers, Daniel Brown and Hilary Dudding, denied the allegation.
Carroccia said she had not seen any behavior that would cause her concern, but concluded the jury’s negative impression of the defense could impact their impartiality and was a problem that could not be remedied.
Michael McLeod, Dillon Dube, Carter Hart, Cal Foote and Alex Formenton were charged with sexual assault last year for an incident with a then-20-year-old woman that allegedly took place when they were in London, Ontario, for a Hockey Canada gala celebrating their championship at that year’s world junior tournament. McLeod faces an additional charge of being a party to the offense of sexual assault.
All have pleaded not guilty. None of them are on an NHL roster or have an active contract with a team in the league.
The woman, appearing via a video feed from another room in the courthouse, has testified that she was drunk, naked and scared when men started coming into a hotel room and that she felt she had to go along with what the men wanted her to do. Prosecutors contend the players did what they wanted without taking steps to ensure she was voluntarily consenting to sexual acts.
Defense attorneys have cross-examined her for days and suggested she actively participated in or initiated sexual activity because she wanted a “wild night.” The woman said she has no memory of saying those things and that the men should have been able to see she wasn’t in her right mind.
A police investigation into the incident was closed without charges in 2019. Hockey Canada ordered its own investigation but dropped it in 2020 after prolonged efforts to get the woman to participate. Those efforts were restarted amid an outcry over a settlement reached by Hockey Canada and others with the woman in 2022.
Police announced criminal charges in early 2024, saying they were able to proceed after collecting new evidence they did not detail.
(Carolina wins 4-1)
▶ Game 1: Carolina 2-1 (OT)
▶ Game 2: Washington 3-1
▶ Game 3: Carolina 4-0
▶ Game 4: Carolina 5-2
▶ Game 5: Carolina 3-1
(Series tied 3-3)
▶ Game 1: Toronto 5-4
▶ Game 2: Toronto 4-3
▶ Game 3: Florida 5-4
▶ Game 4: Florida 2-0
▶ Game 5: Florida 6-1
▶ Game 6: Toronto 2-0
▶ Game 7: Sunday at Toronto, TBA
(Dallas leads 3-2)
▶ Game 1: Dallas 3-2
▶ Game 2: Winnipeg 4-0
▶ Game 3: Dallas 5-2
▶ Game 4: Dallas 3-1
▶ Game 5: Winnipeg 4-0
▶ Game 6: Saturday at Dallas, 8
▶ Game 7: x-Monday at Winnipeg, TBA
(Edmonton wins 4-1)
▶ Game 1: Edmonton 4-2
▶ Game 2: Edmonton 5-4 (OT)
▶ Game 3: Vegas 4-3
▶ Game 4: Edmonton 3-0
▶ Game 5: Edmonton 1-0 (OT)
x-If necessary
