Leafs Postgame: Montreal Shuts Out Toronto, Everyone Falls Asleep

You know those low-scoring games that contain exciting end-to-end action and excellently stingy goaltending? This was not one of those games.

Besides a single goal from prolific non-goal scorer Dale Weise early in the second period, this game featured very little excitement. When both teams weren’t running each others’ goaltenders, they were playing back-and-forth hockey that resulted in a lot of offensive zone turnovers and very few real scoring chances. 

Even on the powerplay, both teams couldn’t generate a thing. Toronto went 0-3 with the extra man while Montreal went 0-6. I guess the Leafs penalty killing units deserve some praise this evening.

If there was anything to pay close attention to tonight, it was the battle of the pro tryouts. All four of the Leafs’ PTOs were in the lineup tonight, vying for one of those last few roster spots and contracts in the organization. If I was a betting man, it looks like Brad Boyes has the inside track on sticking around past the preseason. Curtis Glencross, Devin Setoguchi and Mark Fraser just haven’t done enough to impress.

It counted for nothing, but James van Riemsdyk had a beauty goal in the mandatory overtime when he carried the puck across the blueline, blew past Dale Weise on the outside and pulled back to the middle of the ice to tuck it under the crossbar for the “OT Winner”. 

This happened 44 seconds into the extra frame, so… yeah. That’s kind of it. 

We’ll give it to James Reimer, just because he made a good first impression early on in the game and no one else would be able to top that. Reimer made 20 saves on 21 shots – it was a good outing, but I wouldn’t say he’s any closer to stealing the starting netminder’s job away from Jonathan Bernier.

The Leafs will be back at it again on Tuesday when they travel to Buffalo to take on the Sabres. Tune into TSN4 for the 7:00pm puck drop.