Leafs Lose Fourth of the Season

The Leafs have not started a season with this bad of a record since, I believe 91/92 when on November 10th of that year they were a dismal 2 and 16. Let's not have repeat of that shall we?

The Achilles heal for the Maple Leafs again so far this season is over all team defense. You can say what you want about goaltending, and Ron Wilson said something about that this morning but I'll get to that later.

But over all, the Leafs have been brutal in their own zone. It's almost like they are smearing Vaseline on their sticks before the game! Turnovers and give aways in their own zone and in the neutral zone are absolutely killing them!

They gave up 3 powerplay goals tonight against a team who, although that are the defending Stanley Cup Champions, found themselves 27th in the league on the powerplay?!? How do you give up 3 powerplay goals to a team with that kind of record?

Toskala, although he looked good at times tonight, is still playing too deep in his net, he is not a large goalie and makes himself even smaller when he plays that style.

Ron Wilson said this morning that Toskala is working hard with their new Goal tending consultant, but that you can't expect ten years of bad habits and a certain style to disappear over night. It will likely take a couple of weeks to start seeing the results.

I understand this rational , but, if the Leafs are going to make the playoffs as both Wilson and Burke eluded to before the season, the team can ill afford play like that from their number one goalie.

The Leafs lost 5 to 2 to the Penguins who last season didn't win a game against the Leafs at the ACC and dropped 3 of 4 to Toronto over all.

They'll need to be better in all areas of the game Monday, when they seek to break their goose egg in New York versus the Rangers.

The heat in particular will be on Vesa Toskala, who made 28 saves and looked uncomfortable in goal for much of the night, and received plenty of mock cheers from a disgruntled crowd of 19,374. Another focal point must be their discipline, as a few key momentum changes were given back by ill-timed penalties.


Jay Rosehill who had 9 penalty minutes in tonight's game, opened the scoring for the Leafs who had three fighting majors tonight including Colton Orr in a decidedly one sided win in the first period.

Hagman scored the only other goal for Toronto, his second of the season.



The Leafs next action come Monday night as they face the new look New York Rangers, and as always, you can hear all the action live, right here on Bench Brawl!

Until next time, you kids play safe!

Kadri !, Kadri !, Kadri !!

The Leafs make it 4 in a row with another come from behind pre-season win. This one on the back of rookie Nazem Kadri, who not only scored the tying goal late in the third, also scored the winner in a shoot out to make the final 3-2

Kadri's goal in the shoot out made the ">highlight reels everywhere. After the game, Kadri made no secret about his desire to stay with the big club. `Hopefully, I'm making the decision hard,'' said Kadri. ``I appreciate (coach) Ron (Wilson) giving me the opportunity to go out there in some big situations. I think it's really building my confidence.''

While Coach Wilson still remains reluctant to heap to much praise on any one player, he did say this about Kadri's performance. ``All it takes special players is one moment and they can change the outcome (of a game),'' said Wilson. ``He did. Just being in the right spot at the right time, he picked up the puck and buried it big time.''

The Leafs rang the iron twice in overtime and once in the third period, Pittsburgh goaltender John Curry must have brought his horse-shoe, or this game may have had a much different outcome.

After looking a little ordinary in the first, Leafs net-minder Vesa Toskala, settled in well and gave his team a chance to come back, while making a couple of big stops in the over time before thwarting Staal and Conner in the shoot out.

Jamal Mayers got his bell rung pretty good and went down in a heap after getting the wrong end of a clean check from Pittsburghs Wallace, all indications are he'll be fine, but there is still plenty of time for Burke and Wilson to make any adjustments that may be needed.

The Leafs are back in action tonight against the Buffalo Sabres at 7:00pm est. As always, you can hear all of the action right here on Bench Brawl, just click on Listen Live

Until next time, you kids play safe!

McCabe and Panthers burn Leafs in OT

All good things must come to an end. Although, depending on your thinking as to whether the Leafs should play to lose or play to win, this may be just what the Doctor ordered. I only mention this because, I talk to people all the time about how the Leafs are doing, where I think they're going to end up, and what I think they should do ( or not do ). I often find myself repeating the same old tired conversation about how, the Leafs should or shouldn't be playing for a draft pick. I, am of a minority when I state that my position is and always will be, the Leafs should always play to win. If I thought for a second that they were playing to lose, I'd never watch them again. To those who would disagree with me, I say this. Shut up, you're an idiot!

Now, on to the business at hand. The Buds did in fact play tonight and lost 4-3 to the Panthers, thanks to a Bryan McCabe overtime goal at 3:30 of overtime. Toronto seemed to have the game well in hand, leading 3-1 after two periods but couldn't hold the lead.


Stephan Weiss scored early in the third to make it close, and then Stillman scored at 19:07 on the powerplay to send the game to overtime.

Hagman opened the scoring with a highlight reel goal, Antropov scored for the third straight game and I don't think you'll see Luke Schenn try that fancy little spin-o-rama move at the blue line again any time soon, judging by the look on coach Wilsons' face as he left the bench.

The Leafs won't have time to sit around thinking about it though as they shuffle off to Buffalo for a Wednesday night tilt with the Sabres. As always, you can hear all the action live, right here on Bench Brawl!

Well, when they blow it.......

When the blow a win streak, they do it big time. Perhaps the finality of the Sundin signing made them all dizzy. Any how, they did in fact lose, to the best team in the east, the Boston Bruins. My buddy Tim will never let me live this one down! The final score was 8-5. Pavel Kubina, Alexei Ponikarovsky, Nik Antropov, Mikhail Grabovski and Jason Blake scored for the Leafs, who had won three in a row.

Vesa Toskala gave up two goals on five shots in the first 4:34 and was pulled for Curtis Joseph. Though Cujo didn't do much better, allowing four goals on 10 shots in the second period. Toskala came back in for the third, when Boston took a 7-5 lead on Ryder’s goal with 9:18 to play.

“Fernandez came in and made the difference in the game,” Leafs coach Ron Wilson said. “Obviously we didn’t start the way we wanted to. It was obviously a good effort to get back into the game, but when you get down that many goals, it’s tough.”

“Sometimes a change like that kind of calms everybody down,” Fernandez said. “When there’s a lot of goals scored, you just hold your stick a little tighter, try to do too much. Sometimes coaches use that (a goalie change) as a motivator for the team, and I think that’s what happened.

The Maple Leafs next action comes Saturday when they are once again on the road to face the Pittsburgh Penguins, and as always, you can hear the call right here on Bench Brawl!