Story byBilly HeyenFri, January 16, 2026 at 2:50 PM UTC·2 min readMaple Leafs' departed Mitch Marner took subtle jab at Auston Matthews originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here. The Toronto Maple Leafs took on the Vegas Golden Knights on Thursday night. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAnd you know what that means: Mitch Marner against his former team. The Maple Leafs, of course, signed-and-traded Marner to the Golden Knights in the offseason after Marner made it clear he wouldn't be returning to Toronto in free agency. So they got Nicolas Roy in return, and Vegas got an extra year on Marner's contract. Now, the two-way star Marner is having a great season in Vegas while the Leafs have struggled for much of the campaign. When they faced off Thursday night, Marner shared an amusing moment (at least to the neutral fan) with his former star teammate Auston Matthews. When both left the ice at the end of warmups, Marner fired a puck over toward Matthews. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementMatthews seemed to ignore it, and after the game, he said, "I didn't look over.
