Knies' evolution into a leader for Toronto is just one takeaway from a telling trip down South with the playoffs on the horizon.

Matthew Knies scored a game-winning goal in overtime to record his second hat trick of the season, and the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Tampa Bay Lightning 4-3 on Wednesday night.

TAMPA -- Matthew Knies completed a hat trick at 2:56 of overtime to give the Toronto Maple Leafs a 4-3 victory against the Tampa Bay Lightning at Amalie Arena on Wednesday. Knies won it when he stuffed the puck into an open net off a backdoor pass from Auston Matthews.

Although the Lightning dropped their fourth game of the season to Toronto, there were a lot of positives to take out of this contest. They competed hard and carried play for much of the night. They battled back twice from third-period deficits.

Matthew Knies scored a game-winning goal in overtime to record his second hat trick of the season, and the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Tampa Bay Lightning 4-3 on Wednesday night. Toronto opened up a three-point lead on Tampa Bay for first place in the Atlantic Division with four games left for each team.

Today, we celebrate improvement. As opposed to victory, first place or better playoff seeding. When you put it that way, improvement sounds like a pretty lousy consolation prize considering all that was at stake for the Lightning against Toronto on Wednesday night.