Maple Leafs HC Craig Berube makes his feeling known about Max Pacioretty’s double penalties after comeback

The Toronto Maple Leafs lost 5-2 to the Pittsburgh Penguins on Saturday at PPG Paints Arena, their second loss in a row. Max Pacioretty received two penalties in the second period for roughing against Kris Letang. The first one was at 05:33 and the other at 07:45. Additionally, Matthew Knies (first period), Auston Matthews (third period) and Alexander Nylander (third period) also served penalties.

Leafs coach Craig Berube spoke about Pacioretty’s performance, noting his two penalties in his return to the lineup.

“A little aggressive at times.,” Berube said on Saturday, via Leafslatest. “He hasn’t played in a while. He wants to be physical and do what he does. We just went to the box too much in general — five times. There are good players over there.”

Mitch Marner had a goal and an assist, and William Nylander scored his 17th goal. Berube praised the team’s offensive effort despite penalties disrupting their game.

“I thought we were really good tonight in the offensive zone," Berube said. "I thought we played our game, forechecked well. We had good O-zone time and opportunities. So, I was happy with a lot of the game. There’s things we can always clean up, right? But I like the effort.”

The Penguins overpowered the Maple Leafs on both the face-off and Power play. Pittsburgh had 64.7 face-offs percentage and 40% of the power play, capitalizing on two out of five opportunities.

The Maple Leafs lost the game with offensive and defensive failure

The Pittsburgh Penguins opened the scoring at 4:39 in the first period when Rickard Rakell made it 1-0. The Toronto Maple Leafs tied it at 1-1 with Mitch Marner scoring on a rebound. Pittsburgh took a 2-1 lead at 14:15 when Bryan Rust scored.

Toronto tied it 2-2 early in the second period as William Nylander scored on a one-timer from the left circle, assisted by Marner. However, Michael Bunting gave the Penguins a 3-2 lead at 5:34 in the third period.

Penguins coach Mike Sullivan praised his team for its performance.

“I thought we were a different team tonight from the drop of the puck," Sullivan said. "It might’ve been the most complete game that we’ve played all year from start to finish."

“I thought it was a great hockey game. It was a lot of tempo to the game. It was a fast-paced game. I thought Toronto played extremely hard and I thought our team played extremely hard."

Late in the game, Pittsburgh added two short-handed empty-net goals. Blake Lizotte scored from long range and Kris Letang finished it for a 5-2 win.