A Victory!

The Leafs were finally able to pull out a win last night after losing eight games in a row. The game itself wasn't exactly the prettiest of tilts, but I'll definitely take the win. I almost turned the game off, seeing as the Leafs were down 3-0 within the first twelve minutes of the first period.

On any other night this would be a guaranteed loss, but with the help of Nashville's extremely undisciplined play, the Leafs were awarded three straight two-man advantages in which they capitalized on, and would eventually lead to a 5-4 Leafs win. Again, something that was pretty out of the ordinary, considering they have one of the worst man-advantage percentages in the league. On those power-plays, Versteeg was able to finally show that he might actually be worth what he's being paid by scoring twice, something that hasn't been seen up until this point. Whether or not he, and the team for that matter, can keep up the effectiveness of their PP remains to be seen.

The rest of the team played reasonably well, and Schenn potted his first goal of the season, along with Kadri getting his first point with an assist. Schenn has been one of the few shining lights for the team, leading the Leafs in the +/- category. One glaring issue with the team though, is the play of that plug Brett Lebda. Too many times have I seen him cough up the puck, or make a very poor defensive play resulting in the other team scoring. Case in point: Last night he had the puck on the offensive blue line, fell over, coughed up the puck, and handed a breakaway goal to Nashville. Why isn't Gunnarsson playing? He at least has an even +/- and an assist while Lebda continues to have a team-worst minus 9, and zero points. Needless to say I continue to question Wilsons decisions, but we're stuck with him for the foreseeable future.