

After getting blown out by the Philadelphia Flyers on Wednesday night, the Toronto Maple Leafs knew they needed to respond in a big way at home against the Colorado Avalanche on Thursday night.

The two teams were held scoreless in the opening period, but exchanged goals in the second period. After battling it out for nearly the entire third period, the Avs managed to take a late lead while shorthanded off a brutal error by Jason Spezza.

Moments after having his stick break, Spezza started to make his way back to the bench to get a new stick. On his way there he heard someone yell that the puck was coming, so he made the quick reaction to try to keep the puck in the zone with his feet. At the last second he realized Morgan Rielly was right there and tried to leave the puck for his teammate, only he ended up getting tangled up with the defenceman and it allowed Valeri Nichushkin to walk in all alone and score the eventual game-winning goal while shorthanded.

Here’s what the 17-year veteran had to say about the entire sequence following the game, courtesy of TSN’s Mark Masters.

Jason Spezza: "I'm going to the bench & then I hear someone yell, 'The puck's coming,' so I make a split-second decision to play it & then Mo yells that he's there & I kind of just froze to try to not get in his way & in turn got in his way more. That game falls on me now ..."

A lot of Leaf fans were quick to put the blame on Spezza as soon as the Avs went up 2-1, and he was feeling just like the rest of them as he put the blame for the loss on himself.



Spezza on #Leafs response after shorthanded goal: "We made a push after that, but it's frustrating. You work to get that power play. It's a game of inches, you make split-second decisions, I made the wrong one tonight there and it cost us." — Kristen Shilton (@kristen_shilton) December 5, 2019

Spezza also showed some love to his goaltender, who kept the team in the game with 27 saves.



Jason Spezza: "Freddie shows a lot about his character coming out & playing like that. He played a great game. Just makes the loss even harder." — Mark Masters (@markhmasters) December 5, 2019

With the loss, the Leafs fall to 13-13-4 on the year and ride a two-game losing skid into St. Louis on Saturday night.