NOT TONIGHT !

OK, OK – enough with the speculation and the cliches:  “shift by shift, strike while the iron is hot, take it day by day, must win, back’s against the wall” – ENOUGH !

It has been 6 years for the Toronto Maple Leafs – they haven’t won a first round series since 2004 (Mitch was 6 years old !).  Nine consecutive closeout game failures.  Tampa Bay has won 11 of their last 12 series.  Wait – is that more of the same ?

This is a different Leafs team.  The adds that GM Kyle Dubas made at the deadline – O’Reilly, Schenn, McCabe, Accurai, Lafferty, Knies have all had an impact on the ice and one would expect in the room.  IMO, the worst thing TML could do is take on the mentality of “3 games to make it.”

During the first 4:15 of the first, the Tampa Bay Lightning played as the champions they have proven to be.  Morgan Reilly put an end to that scoring his third consecutive goal on a hi-glove sider from John Tavares and new guy Mathew Knies.  Not :25 seconds later, TB came back to prove this was not going to be a rollover as Cirelli got the Bolts right back in it.  As long I have suspected, Josh McCabe stepped up with two huge hits – and you know what ?  Not one TB player even challenged him.  As many pundits had warned goalie God Vasilevskiy showed up BIGTIME.  On a Leafs PP, he made HUGE saves on Jarnkrok and Nylander.  SOG 14-9 Tampa and 28-17 shot attempts  – 1-1.

What a great second period that was !  Some guy named Eysimont scored early when Justin Holl went WAY wide on coverage and Sami couldn’t keep his skates together.  A mid-period exchange from both sides sent shivers up most spines but resulted in a knotted game.  Knives took one off the ankle.  TML started the third after Moron laid out Giordano.

Vasilevsky stopped Marner on a breakaway to start the third period.  Say no more.  Leaf killer Nick Paul made it 3-1.  Say no more.  Look, I don’t want to be that prick that says “I’m not that surprised”, but I guess I am.  The Lightning were aggressive and confident.  Leafs Nation was aroused when a “too little, too late” AM 34 garbage goal snuck in to make it interesting (briefly), but the Bolts were superior tonight and the EN 4-2 goal proved it. 

HOPPER NOTES:   Mo Reilly has 7 points in his renaissance playoff series – I think the steadiness of Luke Schenn has allowed him to “run free”…lovely to see that Corry Perry was not a factor this evening…I wish we could have seen a little more from Marner/Mathews (other than late in the game)…WHY can they NEVER make it easy on themselves ?!?…the Leafs opportunity to erase history will have to wait…CHEERS !