TORONTO — Goals from Calle Jarnkrok and Mitchell Marner ignited the Toronto Maple Leafs late in the second period. They then survived a late-game scare to score a 4-3 win against the Philadelphia Flyers on Thursday afternoon.
In their final outing before the Christmas break, the Maple Leafs (21-7-6) increased their victory string at Scotiabank Arena to six games and a perfect 5-0 in December.
The Flyers (11-16-7) arrived in Toronto with the second-worst record in the Eastern Conference. But after the Maple Leafs built a 4-1 advantage, Morgan Frost and Joel Farabee scored 83 seconds apart to make it a one-goal game with 6:36 left in the third period.
Farabee missed an open net a couple of shifts after his goal.
Toronto buzzed around the visitors before a matinee crowd of 18,908, but Flyers goalie Carter Hart stopped the first 23 shots he faced.
The 24th shot, a Jarnkrok redirect from a Marner shot, finally beat Hart with 3:10 left in the second period. Pierre Engvall, playing in his 200th career game, recorded the secondary assist on Jarnkrok’s goal.
Marner slid a shot underneath Hart’s right pad 2:47 later for Toronto’s second goal, 13 seconds into a power play. Michael Bunting kept the good vibrations moving by completing a William Nylander to Auston Matthews passing play for a two-goal lead.
Nylander hit the 20-goal mark in the third period before Frost tucked in a wrist shot on the next shift.
HURRICANES 4, PENGUINS 3 (OT): Jaccob Slavin scored 23 seconds into overtime to give visiting Carolina a victory over Pittsburgh.
Carolina won its seventh straight game and has points in 13 consecutive contests to match the franchise record.
RANGERS 5, ISLANDERS 3: Kaapo Kakko scored the tiebreaking goal with 2:47 remaining as the Rangers rallied by the visiting Islanders for their eighth win in nine games.
Barclay Goodrow had a goal and two assists, Julien Gauthier had a goal and an assist, and Artemi Panarin and Vincent Trocheck also scored for the Rangers. Igor Shesterkin stopped 15 shots to improve to 2-7-1 in 10 career games against the Islanders.
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