Matthews tied it 2-2 with a power-play goal at 16:51. William Nylander knocked the puck off Chicago forward Ilya Mikheyev’s stick behind the net, where it was picked up by Matthews and shot over goalie Spencer Knight’s glove from below the right hashmarks.
Joshua then put the Maple Leafs in front 3-2 at 16:59. He lifted the stick of Blackhawks defenseman Louis Crevier and got to the rebound of Troy Stecher’s shot from the neutral zone, lifting it over Knight’s glove from the slot.
“It’s more of a lesson that when we play our game, things go the right way and when we are not on our game, it goes the wrong way. Pretty simple lesson,” Joshua said. “It’s cliché but it’s a full 60-minute game and that’s what we need to win.”
Matthews had a goal and an assist, Nylander had two assists and Joseph Woll, who missed the past four games with a lower-body injury, made 23 saves for the Maple Leafs (15-12-5), who are 5-1-2 in their past eight games.
“You build your game throughout the game, it adds up,” Oliver Ekman-Larsson said. “That’s why we have to get the puck deep to make it hard on their defensemen. I thought it paid off at the end, it’s a big win.”
Wyatt Kaiser and Jason Dickinson scored, and Knight made 24 saves for the Blackhawks (13-14-6), who are 1-5-0 in their past six games.
“Obviously it’s a gut punch at the end,” Chicago coach Jeff Blashill said. “We played a really good game and probably deserved a win for 56 minutes, I guess. Credit to them, that goal by Matthews on the power play was a miscue by us, but Nylander makes an unreal play and Matthews makes an unreal play and then it was an unfortunate bounce there on the winning goal. The reality is, if we play like this on a consistent basis, we’re going to win lots of games. You have to understand process and go back at it. We have to do a good job of having a short-term memory.”
Chicago was without forward Connor Bedard, who missed his second straight game with an upper-body injury and was placed on injured reserve on Monday.
Ekman-Larsson cut it to 2-1 at 9:59 of the third period when his shot from the point deflected off Crevier in the slot.
“You kind of feel like you’re in control most of the game,” Kaiser said. “It’s the game of hockey, it’s a little crazy so just try to manage that and not get too high or too low.”
“That’s the way it goes sometimes. We’ve been on both sides of it where sometimes it goes your way, sometimes it doesn’t. Just have to put it in the past and move on.”
The Blackhawks went up 1-0 at 10:21 of the first period. After Dominic Toninato won the face-off in the left circle of the offensive zone and passed it back to Kaiser at the blueline, Kaiser stepped into the slot and got a wrist shot past Woll’s glove.
