LEAFS BEATEN BY THE BEST, AGAIN

This act is getting real old now, giving up leads that you worked so hard for, but only to see them slip away with careless play.

Coming into this game versus the East leading Boston Bruins, the Leafs had just one win in their last seven games. You can now make it eight games.

The Leafs did play a good hockey game, but only for forty minutes. The Boston Bruins have proved this year that they aren’t pushovers as in years past, and are for real. They showed that by coming back from a 3-1 deficit in the third period.

The Bruins were only one of two teams without any victories when trailing after two periods, and now the Florida Panthers remain the lone team.

For the Leafs, they couldn’t have asked for a better start to loosen themselves up, especially on home ice, considering that they have been shutout in the past two home games.

They snapped that nasty slide as Jason Blake, who has had a great resurgence of late, scored the opening goal of the game.

Before that goal, the Bruins really trapped the Leafs with their quick passing out of their own zone and out. And anytime Toronto tried to carry the puck through the neutral zone, they would be stopped and Boston would takeaway the puck.

With such great pressure early on the Bruins answered right back and had the Toronto defence running around, and the Bruins were able to make a full line change while still in the Toronto zone. With the Leafs all tired, Blake Wheeler tipped in a shot from the point to tie the game at one’s.

As the period wore on, the pace of the game picked up and provided great excitement.

With about two minutes to go in the period, the used to be goal scorer Nik Antropov, who is now goal-less in his last sixteen games, cleared the puck before a Boston player could tap it into the empty net. At least Antropov is showing that he can still play on one end of the ice.

Four minutes into the second period, Lee Stempniak scored his eighth goal of the year on the power play, and just his fifth goal in 27 games with the Leafs.

In the past three games, the Toronto power play had been clicking at a success rate of 33% (3/9), and went 1/4 tonight.

From that point on, the Leafs cracked the Bruins’ defensive scheme and were able to generate good scoring chances and showed a strong awareness from there. The Leafs outshot the Bruins 15-11 in the second period, and 34-30 for the game.

The more noticeable lines were that of the Mikhail Grabovski, Nik Kulemin, and Niklas Hagman line. Grabovski really carried that line, as he played with an extra bounce in his step.

The second line, which crashed the net and the boards, was the line of Jamal Mayers, John Mitchell and Brad May. With their simple style of play, which is of the dump-and-chase variety, they were able to produce the third Toronto goal.

Brad May was the goal scorer and tipped in a John Mitchell shot, and that was May’s first goal of the year and as a Leaf. That was also his first goal in 59 games.

Speaking of slumps, how about Toronto native Jamal Mayer’s who hasn’t scored a goal in his past 25 games. In his career he hasn’t scored a goal in Toronto, and that includes seven games as a St. Louis Blue.

Soon after that third Toronto goal, the Bruins once again came right back, but were stopped on a double pad stack by Toskala as he robbed Byron Bitz who was all alone in front of the net.

On the night, both goalies came up big for their teams.

Vesa Toskala showed he was in the game real early when Boston got a shot off from the slot, and Toskala made a great save with his glove. The momentum and weight of his body went one way, and he still made the save. Toskala played a smart game, and kept the Leafs in it when Boston could’ve ran away with the game in the third period.

How about the unorthodox style of play from Tim Thomas? This guy just keeps on getting the job done, no matter which way he does it, and for his efforts has the number one save percentage for starting goaltenders, while his counterpart Toskala sports the worst.

Thomas’ head turning style of play showed up when he made a save on a Toronto point shot while sitting on his butt. If that had gone in, it would’ve been 4-1 Leafs. And on one Toronto rush, with Blake coming down the wing Thomas lunged towards Blake, and didn’t even go for the puck.

In the third period, the Bruins stepped up their game and their strong crisp passing was too much for the Leafs and committed all four of their penalties in the third period.

The first penalty came 18 seconds into the period, and the other three came at 10.39, 7.38, and 3.40 left to play. The Bruins made good on the first and third power play.

Dennis Wideman just got one to go through the legs of Toskala who got a piece, but the puck also went in off a Toronto skate. That goal came seconds before the penalty had expired.

The goal that tied the game came a off a bullet pass from Marc Savard to a pinching yellow-teethed six foot nine Slovakian Zdeno Chara. On that play, rookie David Krejci showed his great vision and strong passing ability.

Right before that, Jamal Mayers had a great chance to clear the puck down the ice and kill some time as he had the Bruins trapped on a delayed off-side, but shot the puck into the team bench. Instead of twenty seconds coming off the clock, only three came off.

Just like that, the game was tied, the Toronto penalty killers were gassed and could only do so much, and another lead that was built through strong play, disappointingly vanished. The Bruins giving up three goals is a rarity, and when you have them down, lock down defensively and play smart. At the same time, these Bruins boast a team with six players that have +20 rating or more, so they are really never out of any game.

The Bruins thoroughly outplayed the Leafs in the third and Toronto got themselves into that mess, because all the penalties that were taken were real stupid. Three of four of those calls were holding penalties.

In overtime, Toronto had a chance to win the game on a power play, but were either stopped on some real good shots, or shot wide of the net.

The Bruins took the game 4-3 in a shootout. With the Leafs up 2-1 in the shootout, and one more shooter to go, Boston’s Martin St. Pierre scored to tie the shootout. The fourth Toronto shooter missed, and career 1/11 shooter Michael Ryder won the game with the last shot.

Before the game, the Leafs honored Ace Bailey, and when the first ever All-Star game was played in his name. Bailey’s number six is just one of two retired by the Leafs and was the first ever number to be retired out of the four major sports leagues in North America. The other retired Leaf number is the number five Bill Barilko wore.


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