RECAP: Third-period preseason road rally sends Red Wings past Maple Leafs, 3-1

TORONTO -- The all-around performance put forth by the Detroit Red Wings en route to their 3-1 preseason victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs at Scotiabank Arena on Thursday night certainly didn’t go unnoticed by head coach Todd McLellan.

“We talked to the players before the game, and it was ‘you and us,’” McLellan said. “The ‘you’ part, they had to prepare themselves individually for the season coming up. I wasn’t too sure that everybody was at that point yet, so we challenged them there. And the ‘us’ part, we got to put that all together. I thought this was the most complete effort of the exhibition season, where we started to see the structure come and pace of play. Those are all positive signs.”

Goalie Cam Talbot was solid between the pipes for Detroit, turning aside 18 of 19 shots. At the other end of the ice, netminder Anthony Stolarz made 39 saves for Toronto.

“I think we got a lot of shots to them,” said Alex DeBrincat, who scored the go-ahead goal just after the halfway point of the third period. “Didn’t make it too hard on [Stolarz] in the first two periods, made it a little bit harder in the third and obviously, got rewarded. Continuing on, we got to get a lot of shots but get in [opposing goaltenders’] eyes and make it real hard on [them].”

Captain Auston Matthews gave the Maple Leafs a quick lead, scoring six seconds into an early power play with a wrister from the right face-off circle to make it 1-0 at 2:08 of the first period.

The first of two exhibition matchups between the Original Six rivals in a three-day span continued with a scoreless middle frame, and the Red Wings headed into the second intermission leading 28-12 in shots but still down by one.

“They scored on their second shot on goal on a power play, and it took us a little while to re-establish our legs and our forecheck,” McLellan said. “But once that started to happen, I thought the hunt mentality was there, and it was contagious. We passed it off from one line to the next.”

Evening the score for Detroit, captain Dylan Larkin cleaned up a rebound in the slot to make it 1-1 at 5:04 of the third period. The assists went to Ben Chiarot and Emmitt Finnie.

At 12:28 of the final frame, DeBrincat gave the Red Wings a 2-1 lead by batting the puck into the back of the net after Michael Brandsegg-Nygård won a puck battle in front and found him via a reverse pass while falling.

Then Finnie, who was assisted by Moritz Seider, secured Detroit’s second straight preseason win by scoring an empty-net goal with 1:23 left in regulation for the 3-1 final.

“I think we did a good job of hounding the puck, making simple plays and kind of controlling the game for a bit there,” DeBrincat said. “Obviously, a lot of penalties in the second period, but we took that momentum and carried it into the third.”

NEXT UP: The Red Wings and Maple Leafs will finish off their respective 2025-26 preseason schedules when they square off at Little Caesars Arena on Saturday night.

WHAT WAS SAID

McLellan on building on each exhibition game

““We obviously have decisions to make, but as camp goes on you try to narrow your group down more and more, playing more common linemates and stuff like that. We’re coming up to game No. 8 now. It’s crunch time for players. It’s crunch time for staff to make decisions. There are a lot of guys who have played really well and have pushed. We’ll have a real tough task over the next 3-4 days. I’m sure a lot of teams, Toronto probably as well, will have a tough task determining who’s going to start and who isn’t.”

McLellan on having some tough Opening Night roster decisions

“A good problem to have. It’s just solving it. What you do on Day 1 isn’t necessarily what will happen on Day 2. You just live day by day, and that’s how we’ll approach it.”

DeBrincat on the importance of finding chemistry leading up to the regular season

“It’s huge. We got to feel good as a group, feel confident. Obviously, not our full lineup today but pretty close to it. I thought we played pretty well.”