In the first period, Dakota Joshua scored to put the Leafs ahead by one, but that was all she wrote for the early twenty minutes as both teams played back and forth with the puck.<\/p>\n
The Game Came Alive in the Second Period<\/p>\n
Early in the second frame, Andrei Svechnikov and ex-Hurricane Max Domi collided at the Leafs\u2019 blue line. Svechnikov, who was shaken up, was briefly tended to by head athletic trainer Doug Bennett before making his way to the bench, and later, to the locker room. However, he was able to return near the halfway mark.<\/p>\n
In the shift after Svechnikov\u2019s injury, Eric Robinson took a high-stick to the face from Brandon Carlo \u2013 shedding some blood for a double minor. In the final seconds of the four-minute power play, Jordan Staal proved once again to be one of the best things to happen to the man-advantage for Carolina this season as he tipped in a shot from Seth Jarvis.<\/p>\n
Afterwards, Robinson showed up yet again for his team, drawing a hooking penalty from Troy Stecher on the breakaway. He was given a chance for a penalty shot \u2013 the first attempt in his NHL career \u2013 and proceeded to slip a nice little wrister past Joseph Woll to give Carolina their first lead of the night.<\/p>\n
However, that lead was short-lived. Just 72 seconds later, John Tavares worked his way around the back of Brandon Bussi\u2019s net and swept the puck in through the five-hole.<\/p>\n
In the last minutes of the second frame, Sean Walker was thrown into the penalty box for tripping Matthew Knies. However, Walker\u2019s defensive partner wasn\u2019t satisfied with just killing off the penalty, and instead, carried the puck all the way down the ice for the first shorthanded goal of his NHL career.<\/p>\n
It was the second game in a row<\/a> for the Hurricanes to score a shorty.<\/p>\n The third period came, and with a few minutes left, William Nylander squeaked in a goal to force overtime.<\/p>\n Three-on-Three Action<\/p>\n When overtime commenced, the game-winner came from the stick of a player for the very first time: Alexander Nikishin. The rookie defenseman had just come onto the ice in place of Jaccob Slavin as Jarvis sent it his way, but he didn\u2019t have it for long. Quickly skating to the right face-off circle, he wasted no time \u2013 launching it<\/a> through an incidental Leafs screen and past Woll after only 41 seconds had been played. It was not only the first overtime goal of Nikishin\u2019s NHL career, but also his first game-winning goal. For the second game in a row, the Hurricanes\u2019 overtime game winner came from a defenseman.<\/p>\n The game marked an unusual method to victory, as all four of the Hurricanes goals did not come at five-on-five. Instead, they were on the power play, as a penalty shot, shorthanded, and at three-on-three in overtime.<\/p>\n \t\t![\"avatar\"](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1774077379_853_ab783896b73f675bc93cb7c5b0a070ee9f363e9b6b751c7e80dcfd1fd7431eb5.png\")
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