TORONTO (AP) — Jake Muzzin is making a smooth transition to the Toronto Maple Leafs.Muzzin had a goal and two assists Youth Matt Nieto Jersey , Andreas Johnsson had two goals and two assists and the Maple Leafs defeated the Anaheim Ducks 6-1 Monday night.Muzzin, acquired from the Los Angeles Kings for two prospects and a first-round pick last week, has already provided a physical presence and calming influence to a blue line previously viewed as the Leafs’ weak link.“Good team, good coaching, good plan, and it’s easy to follow,” Muzzin said, explaining why things have clicked in Toronto. “They’re very clear in how we’re supposed to play, and that’s how we’re playing.”Set to turn 30 later this month, he’s been blown away by the welcome in Toronto, including the huge ovations from the home crowd for a couple of thunderous hits in his first two home outings.“It’s been awesome,” Muzzin said. “I didn’t know what to expect, really, with media and hockey in general. I’m very pleased with how it’s going.“Hopefully it continues.”William Nylander and John Tavares each had a goal and an assist, and Connor Brown also scored for Toronto, which has won three in a row at Scotiabank Arena after dropping six of their previous seven home games.Frederik Andersen made 24 saves for the Leafs. Zach Hyman added two assists.Rickard Rakell scored for Anaheim. John Gibson made 30 saves before being pulled in favor of Chad Johnson after Toronto scored its fifth goal.The Ducks Mikko Rantanen Jersey , who trailed 6-0 after the first period of Saturday’s 9-3 loss in Winnipeg, lost their fourth straight game and have two victories in their last 18 games (2-12-4).Despite their struggles, the Ducks remain just three points out of the final wild-card spot in the congested Western Conference, thanks in large part to Gibson’s Vezina Trophy-level play this season.“It’s hard on everybody,” head coach Randy Carlyle said. “This is not an easy time.”Locked in a scoreless tie after the opening 20 minutes, the Leafs moved ahead at 3:02 of the second when Tavares snapped his 31st goal of the season, beating Gibson high on the short side while Toronto was in the midst of a line change.Andersen, who shared the Anaheim crease with Gibson from 2013-16 before the trade that made him the Leafs’ No. 1 goalie, stopped Nick Ritchie on a breakaway later in the period, prompting the home crowd to belt out chants of “Freddie! Freddie!”Gibson then robbed Auston Matthews on a Toronto power play, but Johnsson made it 2-0 just 10 seconds after the penalty expired when he backhanded his 11th goal of the season at 13:40. It came off a rebound of s shot by Muzzin through traffic.The Leafs defenseman then rocked Corey Perry near the Ducks bench to once again energize the building.Ritchie took a cross-checking penalty on Muzzin in retaliation moments later.Muzzin made the Ducks pay on the ensuing power play, blasting his fifth goal of the season past Gibson with 2.2 seconds left on the clock, snapping a 2-for-33 skid with the man advantage.Anaheim got on the board at 2:45 of the third when Rakell scored his ninth goal of the season past Andersen’s blocker at 2:45.“There’s nobody in our locker-room that’s not trying,” Rakell said. “We want to do the right things, but our head is not really in the game.”But the Leafs got that one back 31 seconds later, when Brown beat Brandon Montour to the front of the net on a 2-on-2 to rush and chipped his fifth past Gibson.Nylander Nathan MacKinnon Jersey , who came in with just one goal and six assists since ending his contract impasse in early December, then picked the far corner on Gibson for his second goal of the campaign.“It’s coming together,” Nylander said. “Today was a step in the right direction.”That ended the night for Gibson, who has been pulled in three straight games. He went to the locker room and didn’t return to the bench.Johnsson then cut into the slot and fired his 12th past Johnson at 14:51 to make it 6-1.Wearing the team’s road whites, Toronto came out fast against Anaheim — which was sporting its throwback Mighty Ducks uniforms — in the game’s opening minutes.NOTES: Gibson entered play having faced 106 more shots than the next-closest NHL goalie. … Ryan Kesler returned to the Ducks’ lineup after missing five games with a hamstring injury.UP NEXTDucks: At Montreal on Tuesday.Maple Leafs: Host Ottawa on Wednesday. GLENDALE, Ariz. (AP) — The Arizona Coyotes lost four of their first five games, three by shutout.Another lost season in the desert apparently on the way.The thing about those early games, though, is they were close, unlike the start of last season. The Coyotes played well, just couldn’t seem to catch the right break or get pucks to find the net.Once the pucks started going in, the Coyotes couldn’t seem to miss.Behind a scoring flurry that would have been unthinkable on previous teams, Arizona is off to its best 11-game start (6-5-0) since 2013-14.“I really like all our games; we played well in all of them, we competed well,” Coyotes forward Derek Stepan said. “Yeah, we made some mistakes that cost us some goals early on Authentic Alexander Wennberg Jersey , but we’re learning quickly.”It’s been a long-arching curve.The Coyotes have struggled since reaching the 2012 Western Conference finals, seeming to be in perpetual rebuilding mode. Arizona got last season off to a miserable start, needing 12 games to win for the first time to fall out of playoff contention before the season’s first month was over.The Coyotes played better the last two months of the 2017-18 season and hoped it would carry over into this season.It did not, at least early.Arizona opened the season with a pair of shutout losses and had four goals its first five games — three of those in its lone win.Then something clicked.The Coyotes beat the Chicago Blackhawks 4-1 on the road on Oct. 18 and, after a 5-3 loss at Winnipeg, have been one of the NHL’s hottest teams.With Tuesday night’s 5-1 home win over Ottawa, the Coyotes have outscored opponents 20-4 during a four-game winning streak. Arizona has 27 goals over a six-game span, a first for the franchise since 2006-07.“The guys were sticking with it and practicing like the goals would come,” Coyotes coach Rick Tocchet said. “You have to have that mentality in this league. We’ve got good mojo right now and we don’t want to wreck it.”Arizona has been among the league leaders in shots per game since the start of the season and the shooting percentage has dramatically increased since the minuscule 1.6 to start the season.The Coyotes seemed to get some bad breaks on shots early in the season, hitting posts and crossbars, having pucks squirt out of their reach in the offensive zone. They also didn’t seem to create their own luck by getting traffic in front of the crease and putting shots in spots where goalies could make easy saves.The breaks have been coming the past few games, such as Stepan’s blue line, short-handed goal that skittered off the ice and through Ottawa goalie Mike Condon’s pads .Arizona also has been creating some of that luck with hard, smart play, getting traffic in front of opposing goaltenders and more precise shooting.“You earn your bounces,” Stepan said. “We had some bounces going the other way early on in the year Chris Terry Jersey Womens , now they’re starting to go our way and in a few weeks, they’re going to come back the other way. Good teams find ways to win any given night regardless of the bounces.”With the scoring boost, the Coyotes have continued to play stingy defense, the one area that helped them get through the difficult times in the past.Arizona has limited good chances against and its goalies, Antti Raanta and Darcy Kuemper, have been superb, combining to give the Coyotes the NHL’s best goals-against average at 1.91. Raanta, healthy after an injury-filled first season in the desert, is fourth in the NHL with a 1.99 goals-against average.The Coyotes also have the NHL’s second-best penalty kill at 90.6 percent and have a league-high six short-handed goals to three power-play goals allowed. Stepan’s goal against Ottawa gave Arizona short-handed goals in three straight games for the second time in franchise history (1985). The Coyotes are 11th NHL team since 1933 to have five short-handed goals in three games.“When we’re sticking with our game plan and everybody is dialed in, we’re a really good team,” Raanta said. “As a goalie, it’s a dream to play behind that team.”Especially when they’re scoring goals, as they are now.