TORONTO -- Auston Matthews' sizzling start to the 2018-19 season with the Toronto Maple Leafs has put him in the elite company of Hall of Fame forwards Wayne Gretzky, Mario Lemieux and Mike Bossy.
Matthews had two assists in a 4-1 win against the Los Angeles Kings at Scotiabank Arena on Monday, extending his multipoint streak to seven games. The Maple Leafs center joins Lemieux and forward Kevin Stevens (Pittsburgh Penguins, 1992-93), Bossy (New York Islanders, 1984-85) and Gretzky (Edmonton Oilers, 1983-84) as players who started a season with seven consecutive multipoint games.
"I don't know what it is. I'm just trying to play hockey, have fun, get those opportunities and try to cash in on them," said Matthews, whose six-game goal streak ended. "I've been fortunate they've been going in; we've been able to gel as a line and continue to get better and obviously the most important thing is we're winning games, so we just want that to continue."
The Maple Leafs have won five consecutive games and are 6-1-0. Matthews leads the NHL with 16 points (10 goals, six assists).
Maple Leafs coach Mike Babcock opted to play the line of Matthews, left wing Patrick Marleau and right wing Kasperi Kapanen against the Kings' top unit of center Anze Kopitar, left wing Ilya Kovalchuk and right wing Alex Iafallo. Toronto won the matchup, evidenced by Kapanen's two goals.
"What I liked about Auston tonight is he played head-to-head against [Kopitar] and he was really good," Babcock said. "We're blessed to have a guy who can play with and without [the puck], has size and now with his skating the way it is.
"He's a real player. He's just growing, he's just a kid and he's going to get better. He's dangerous when he's on the ice and that line is a good line right now. We're fortunate that we appear to have quite a bit of depth. We're still kind of evolving, trying to figure out how we're going to play everybody, but I think we're going in the right direction."
The start of the Maple Leafs' winning streak was triggered when Babcock replaced forward Tyler Ennis with Kapanen on Matthews' line in the first period against the Chicago Blackhawks on Oct. 7. Toronto trailed 2-0 at the time but rallied for a 7-6 overtime victory.
Matthews has 12 points (seven goals, five assists) since Kapanen was placed on his wing. Kapanen has eight points (four goals, four assists) over that span.
"I think he's got a lot of skill," Matthews said. "Obviously, he can skate fast. I think every game we've kind of been able to just develop more and more chemistry and found each other.
"Tonight was a pretty solid night for him, scoring two goals. It's been fun playing with him."
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