Friday, December 08, 2006
Oh the Pain
Would someone please stop the bleeding, as this is getting out of hand. 6 losses in a row, when the ship starts to stink, it goes down fast. It's not like Leafs are playing bad hockey for 60 minutes, only for the last 20. Once again, the Leafs squandered a third period lead. J.S. Aubin held Bruins scoreless through 2 periods, much like Raycroft did against the Thrashers the other night. And much like the other night, the opposing team came back to win the game. For 3 consecutive games, the Leafs have blown the lead in the third period. During their 6 game losing streak, they have been outscored 18-2. That's terrible. It would be really difficult for any team to be outscored by that much and win hockey games. Who's to blame for this terrible slide? Pretty much everybody. Aubin played well last, but gave a terrible rebound that resulted in the eventual game winning goal, but the outcome can not solely rest on his shoulders. The entire team is playing 'flat' in the third period, team defense goes through lapses, and we don't need to mention how much difficulty they are having scoring. There are no saviors waiting in the wings to help this team out. There are no offensive prospects or players that are injured that can help this team out. They're struck with what they've got to get out this funk.
Game 30 - Leafs 1 Bruins 3
1st Period Summary Time left Team Scoring Detail
No Scoring
Penalties
6:29 Toronto Alexei Ponikarovsky - 2 minutes for hooking
15:03 Boston Marc Savard - 2 minutes for hooking
19:32 Toronto Pavel Kubina - 2 minutes for slashing
2nd Period Summary
14:56 Toronto Goal - Jeff O`Neill (8), from Michael Peca and Brendan Bell at 5:04.
Penalties
3:18 Boston Andrew Alberts - 4 minutes for high-sticking
4:09 Toronto Darcy Tucker - 2 minutes for high-sticking
3rd Period Summary
9:47 Boston Goal - Brad Stuart (5), from Brad Boyes and Marco Sturm at 10:13.
5:53 Boston Goal - Wayne Primeau (5), from Mark Mowers and Shean Donovan at 14:07.
1:19 Boston Goal - Patrice Bergeron (8), from Wayne Primeau and Shean Donovan at 18:41.
Penalties
5:18 Toronto Michael Peca - 2 minutes for high-sticking
11:07 Toronto Darcy Tucker - 2 minutes for charging
11:07 Boston Andrew Alberts - 2 minutes for roughing
14:33 Toronto Pavel Kubina - 2 minutes for diving
14:33 Boston Brad Boyes - 2 minutes for slashing
Shots on Goal 1 2 3 Total
Toronto 7 12 5 24
Boston 8 7 11 26
Team Power Play
Toronto 0 of 3
Boston 0 of 3
Toronto Goaltending
Player SA GA Saves SV% TOI
Jean-Sebastien Aubin 26 3 23 .885 59:15
Boston Goaltending
Player SA GA Saves SV% TOI
Tim Thomas 24 1 23 .958 60:00
Posted by Mark in
Box Scores
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Thursday, December 07, 2006
Surprise, Surprise
In a rare occurrence, the Leafs face-off tonight against the Bruins. At least the some of the teams are coming to their senses with regards to playing divisional teams 8 times throughout the year. They fell 1 vote short of the majority (19 out of 30) for making changes to the schedule for next season. With the vote being that close to the two-thirds required to make a change, they will definitely have to take a closer look at this. I'm guessing that the majority of teams that were opposed to changing the schedule structure were west coast teams. They are the ones that have more issues with the longer travelling distances and expenses, and it's hard to argue that they don't. But playing a team 5 times in 14 games, as it has been for the Leafs, is a bit much. I'm sick of watching the Leaf-Bruins games. An article in the Boston Globe today had a couple good quotes from Marc Savard and Coach Dave Lewis:
"It's getting brutal, you know what I mean?" said Bruins center Marc Savard, who has grown tired of the divisional matchup, as well as the emphasis on divisional play throughout the NHL. "And I mean that from the fans' perspective, too . . . who wants to see the same teams all the time?"
Coach Dave Lewis, when asked his take on the "Play Eight" emphasis of the divisional alignment, added, "I think they could take two of those games and utilize them somewhere else. I don't think you can force rivalries . . . take two of those games and put them somewhere else, that's my opinion."
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