Steve says: Sundin Sundin Sundin!
Well he finally did it. Mats Sundin is the top goal scorer and point getter of any Maple Leaf Ever!
Good on ya Mats!
And, as the gracious leader that he is, he immediately thanked the fans for their help along the way.
There will be many sites praising Sundin for all of his accomplishments so I am sure if you want more Sundin stats you can Google them easily enough. I want to talk about the game itself.
The loss to Carolina was exactly what the Leafs needed to kick them in the ass. They have been playing (for the most part) slightly above mediocre hockey and squeaking out wins here and there. Then a team like Carolina comes to town and say hey Leafs, suck on this!
The team could have gone one of 2 directions after the loss to the Hurricanes...suck more or kick some ass....I'm glad they chose the latter.
Everything was really firing for the buds. they cut back on penalties (still more than I would have liked, but getting better), the defencemen actually started to hit. They called up some speed in Gamache (who I thought should have made the opening roster) and I gotta say that Raycroft looked pretty sharp.
The thing that made Raycroft look sharp is that our defencemen cleared the front of the net and they cleared away rebounds for a change. Most goalies in the NHL can stop what they see. It's the screened shots and the rebounds that get behind them. So when our defencemen actually do their jobs, even Raycroft looks good!
If they can keep up that style of hitting defence and solid rebound clearing, our goalie tandem will take us a long way!
Go Leafs!
Chris says:
So they gave Mats Sundin all three stars last night.
Not too shabby. Scratch that. It was freaking amazing.
In an 8-1 slaughter of the Islanders Sundin finally found that elusive point number 917 to sneak past Sittler as the Leaf’s all time point leader.
Sundin is slowly but surely winding up his career. Which means the opportunities for him to hoist a cup over his head are starting to shrink. Is this the team that can help turn it all that around for him? My gut reaction says no. Essentially we’re the same team as last year, good, but not good enough. The Leafs made a smart upgrade upfront landing Blake but what they really need is another high level sniper and a consistently solid puckstopper. Both of which have eluded this club for the last couple of seasons.
But it’s a long season and we’re barely out of the gate here. And while it’s nice to get in a drubbing like that every now and again, that accomplishment is diminished slightly by the fact that the Leafs were on the receiving end of a similar pounding only two nights earlier.
With such a demanding schedule ahead of them the trick to making it into the playoffs is going to be consistency, and unfortunately, on that front we’ve been found lacking.
So while it’s important to enjoy this milestone while we can, our number one focus has to be on making sure that we’re bringing our A-game to the ice, week in and week out.
Not too shabby. Scratch that. It was freaking amazing.
In an 8-1 slaughter of the Islanders Sundin finally found that elusive point number 917 to sneak past Sittler as the Leaf’s all time point leader.
Sundin is slowly but surely winding up his career. Which means the opportunities for him to hoist a cup over his head are starting to shrink. Is this the team that can help turn it all that around for him? My gut reaction says no. Essentially we’re the same team as last year, good, but not good enough. The Leafs made a smart upgrade upfront landing Blake but what they really need is another high level sniper and a consistently solid puckstopper. Both of which have eluded this club for the last couple of seasons.
But it’s a long season and we’re barely out of the gate here. And while it’s nice to get in a drubbing like that every now and again, that accomplishment is diminished slightly by the fact that the Leafs were on the receiving end of a similar pounding only two nights earlier.
With such a demanding schedule ahead of them the trick to making it into the playoffs is going to be consistency, and unfortunately, on that front we’ve been found lacking.
So while it’s important to enjoy this milestone while we can, our number one focus has to be on making sure that we’re bringing our A-game to the ice, week in and week out.
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