BUFFALO, N.Y. – Matt Murray looked at the scoreboard above him, counted down the seconds as they disappeared and finally pumped his fist.
It had been 638 days since Murray last felt the feeling course through him.
Bilateral hip surgery forced the Toronto Maple Leafs goaltender to sit out the entire 2023-24 season, the finale of a four-year contract. There was no guarantee that the oft-injured Murray would play in the NHL again. A one-year contract gave him a lifeline to stay far out of the spotlight in the AHL, with just one goal.
And more than a year and a half later, Murray was back where he had been fighting: in the NHL win column after stopping 24 shots in a 6-3 victory over the Buffalo Sabers.
“A long road. A big mountain to climb. But I kept this moment in my mind on the days when it felt hard,” Murray said.
The 30-year-old’s eyes turned redder with every word he spoke after the match. His voice trembled.
“A big release,” he said, struggling to find the words to put nearly two years away from the NHL into perspective. “A flow of emotions.”
Goalkeepers’ typical hugs with teammates after victory were firmer and longer. In a physical game where a player’s career can turn on a dime, Murray’s return resonated far more heavily than the two points the Leafs also added that day.
“It’s good to see (Murray) smiling,” Steven Lorentz said, “because you know he’s back doing what he loves.”
In the locker room, Max immediately presented Domi Murray with the team’s WWE-style wrestling belt as player of the game. Murray’s up-and-down performance was secondary.
“He got that thing, 100 percent, he deserved it,” Domi said. “The ability to mentally persevere. From all those days I’m sure he had a lot of doubts, it’s a long road to recovery. We are all very proud of him.”
It’s easy to quantify how long Murray’s road back to the NHL was in days: 628 of them between his last two appearances.
It is much more difficult to accurately describe how difficult that road is.
Injuries dogged Murray throughout his career after he won back-to-back Stanley Cup titles in his first two seasons in the NHL with the Pittsburgh Penguins. His games played decreased each season from 2018 to 2022. After being traded to the Leafs in the summer of 2022, he struggled through his freshman season. One wondered if hip surgery would be the final dagger in his NHL career.
But Murray would still hang out with teammates at the Leafs practice facility during his rehab last season, feeling so close but so far away from the competition he once conquered.
“The fact that he’s just on his way back says a lot about his character and his dedication to the game,” Lorentz said.
Murray had a booth full of his stuff in that facility that was never used. An important and human gesture from the Leafs organization, but still a reminder that Murray did not play NHL games.
Even after re-signing with the Leafs on a one-year contract worth $875,000, he felt like the organization’s fourth goalie. When the Leafs needed a netminder to replace the injured Anthony Stolarz, they brought in Dennis Hildeby. The lanky Hildeby is seven years younger than Murray.
How could Murray not wonder if his return to the NHL would ever happen?
“There were definitely moments where it felt really hard,” Murray said. “But whenever I felt that way, I had a great group of people around me. That’s the only reason I’m here.”
All Murray could do was enjoy himself, far away from public view, quietly hoping for the return that finally came on Friday night.
“Emotions were high today,” Murray said.
Those emotions were perhaps at their highest before the match. The typically stoic Murray allowed himself to pause for a moment and realize how far he has come.
“I was able to take a moment during warmups and during the national anthem and look around and appreciate the long journey it’s been and think about all the people who helped me get here,” Murray said.
It was the kind of play that reminded spectators of the fragility of an NHL career. Only a few years separated Murray from Stanley Cup glory until he was largely written off from the NHL, all essentially before the age of 30.
“You feel for a guy like that because he works so hard and he wants it so bad,” Lorentz said. “We’re all rooting for him.”
Murray moved well enough in his return. He swallowed most of the 27 shots the Sabers threw at him, looking every bit the veteran he is. Murray conceded two goals, recalled after video review. His extended save on Sabers forward Alex Tuch was a reminder of the athleticism he can provide now that he’s also fully healthy.
These are all qualities that Leafs fans may have forgotten. But they are qualities that are still paramount among Murray’s Leafs teammates.
“It’s not forgotten in my mind what he accomplished in his career in this league,” said Leafs forward Max Pacioretty, no stranger to debilitating career-threatening injuries. “It’s hard to almost remember what you’ve done, what you’ve accomplished, because it seems like all the noise is always in the moment, whether it’s the injury or what’s happened lately.”
Perhaps the Leafs victory could have been predicted in advance. Sure, they were playing a reeling Sabers team that has now endured twelve straight losses. And they were backed by a budding, red-hot line of Max Domi, Bobby McMann and Nick Robertson. They’re the third line in name only: The trio combined for three goals and six points against the Sabres.
But the opposition should not denigrate what was paramount not only for Murray, but also for the Leafs in Buffalo. They wanted to do the right thing for a player who has done everything he can to return to the NHL. You didn’t have to squint to see a defenseman like Jake McCabe throwing Sabers out of Murray’s crease with a little extra gusto.
“It gives you an incentive to go the extra mile because you know (Murray) has gone the extra mile to get back to this position where he’s good,” Lorentz said. “It’s not like he was half-hearted about getting back to this point and he expected to be here. Such operations and injuries that he has gone through can hinder your career for a long time. You may never be able to recover to your old shape.”
But Murray is working to get back to the Matt Murray of old. And the Leafs’ need for Murray won’t end when they head north to Toronto via the QEW.
Stolarz’s first return from a knee injury will be mid-to-late January. Hildeby doesn’t exactly have the full confidence of the Leafs organization at this point after allowing a few soft goals in a recent call-up against the Sabers at home, combined with a less-than-stellar AHL season thus far. He will likely become an NHL player down the road, but there is room for him to grow and develop more confidence in his game.
But Murray has what no other goalie in the Leafs organization has: experience. And that’s important to Brad Treliving and Craig Berube: both value the games played and prefer to lean on veterans where possible.
They will lean on Murray because of everything he has done and experienced in his career.
After Friday evening, that career will look drastically different.
“The reality is you have to take each day as it comes and you never know when it’s all going to be over,” Pacioretty said. “So you don’t want to take days for granted.”
After Murray dried his eyes and slowly removed the pounds of goalkeeping equipment, heavy with sweat, he sat down alone in the locker room. The Leafs equipment staff all stopped unloading bags from the locker room to give him a gentle pat on the back.
Murray looked up and saw a note written on a whiteboard in the locker room. The Leafs bus was leaving in 20 minutes. There was another NHL game on the horizon.
He could smile again, knowing that it certainly won’t be 628 days before he can do what he loves.
(Top photo: Timothy T. Ludwig / Imagn Images)