Matthews inspired by home crowd, teammates on way to winning All-Star MVP

TORONTO -- Jim Montgomery needed only one word to describe what it was like to coach Auston Matthews.

“Easy,” he quipped.

The Boston Bruins coach was tasked with heading up Team Matthews at the 2024 Honda (U.S.)/ Rogers (Canada) NHL All-Star Game at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto on Saturday, the team that ended up prevailing over Team McDavid for the All-Star Game crown after a 7-4 victory in the final.

“Tell him to go over, he scores,” Montgomery said. “Go over the boards! Again, again!”

Clearly, he didn’t mind having Matthews on his side instead of on the opposing bench.

It was a game that saw the Toronto Maple Leafs captain score two goals and have an assist to earn Most Valuable Player honors in his home arena, a game in which Matthews clearly ramped up his play as the final game went on and the win -- both the accolades and the $1 million bonus to the winning team -- looked close.

“You could tell [he wanted it],” Montgomery said. “I noticed him and [William] Nylander too talking about backchecking. I didn’t expect that.”

He laughed.

It has been an outstanding season for Matthews, one in which he has already scored 40 goals, putting him on pace for 70, a mark which hasn’t been hit in the NHL since 1992-93, when both Teemu Selanne and Alexander Mogilny did it. And that didn’t stop with the NHL on its All-Star break.

Matthews, who has 58 points in 46 games this season, was not only an ambassador for Toronto, showing off his city and his team and his home area, but he showed off all of his skills, both in the NHL All-Star Skills presented by DraftKings Sportsbook, in which he finished third, behind Connor McDavid and Cale Makar, and in the All-Star Game itself.

“I’ve seen all the work that he puts in in the summer,” said close friend and Team Matthews teammate Clayton Keller of the Arizona Coyotes. “I’ve said it before, but I’ve never seen him go through the motions or take a rep off. Everything is gamelike and you can tell. I’ve learned from him, for sure.”

In addition to his three points in the final, Matthews had another assist in the semifinal, a 6-5 shootout win against Team Hughes.

“We wanted to win, for sure,” Matthews said. “Talking in the locker room, I don’t think there was much messing around. Everybody was pretty much on the same page, to try to go out there, put in a pretty good effort and try to come out with a good result.”

Which they did.

Matthews started his scoring early in the final, sending a cross-crease pass to Keller for the first goal of the game at 2:19 of the first period. After David Pastrnak scored at 8:08, Matthews answered back five seconds later to put his team back ahead 3-2. He finished off his scoring to make the game 5-3 at 4:59 of the second.

While Matthews is no stranger to All-Star Games -- this was his fifth -- it was a different experience to do it in Toronto. Matthews was one of four Maple Leafs in the game, along with forwards Mitchell Marner and Nylander and defenseman Morgan Rielly.

Plus he got to have friend Justin Bieber as his celebrity captain behind the bench.

“The whole weekend itself was special for all of us,” Matthews said. “Especially the host city and the hometown guys. Just special to have an All-Star Game in Toronto and get to share the experience with some close teammates, friends, and obviously the fans here in the city.

“Nice to cap it off with the win. Everybody goes home happy.”