1ST PERIOD NOTES:
Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry with a good scoring chance in the first few minutes. Imagine that, another pre-arranged fight with George Parros and Colton Orr. No doubt, both teams were incredibly inspired by the W.W.E. style event. Big save by Jonas Gustavsson at the corner of the net with his legs. Matt Stajan retaliates on a hit with a cross check, and takes away what would have been an advantage. Tomas Kaberle and Mike Komisarek give away the puck and create a dangerous chance for the Ducks. Garnet Exelby pushes Todd Marchant into the net as Petteri Nokelainen scores for Anaheim . Leafs and Ducks in a line dance after Ryan Getzlaf and Francois Beauchemin shove and swing at each other. Leafs are on the power play and James Wisniewski’s penalty leaves Anaheim 2 men short. Mikhail Grabovski scores with the 2 man advantage. Niklas Hagman also scores on the power play with a high shot over the shoulder. Ducks take another stupid penalty by Nokelainen. John Mitchell almost scores near the end of the period.
2ND PERIOD NOTES:
Up and back play with no clear edge for either team in the first few minutes of the period. The Ducks Matt Beleskey ,takes a penalty for hooking. Randy Carlyle, ( former Leafs defenseman ), must be going crazy watching his team take dumb penalties. Leafs apply pressure around the Ducks net on the power play. Scott Niedermayer gets 2 minutes for roughing leaving the Leafs with a 5 on 3 power play. Hagman scores on the 2 man advantage with a high wrist shot from the corner. Jonas Gustavsson makes a good glove save, with traffic in front of the net. Colton Orr takes a hooking penalty. Bobby Ryan scores on the Anaheim power play . Leafs give away the puck and create a dangerous scoring chance for the Ducks. For the rest of the period, the play goes back and forth between the zones.
3RD PERIOD NOTES:
Ducks applying pressure on the Leafs early in the third period. Lee Stempniak scores for the Leafs between the legs of Jonas Hiller. A soft goal that Hiller should have stopped, with the shot taken from the slot. Anaheim called on a mistake by the referee on a phantom slash by Wisniewski. A brutal call by the referee. Kaberle scores on a delayed penalty call to Niedermayer after a dangerous check into the boards with the Grabovski in possession of the puck facing the boards. The Ducks are short handed with Niedermayer off for 2 minutes, after the Leafs goal. Leafs with the man advantage for the 9th time in this game and 5 on 3 once again. Hagman scores and has the hat trick on the power play, to make it 6-2 for Toronto. The Ducks are playing like a lazy disinterested team. They’ve show zero discipline and look like they want to be somewhere other than at this hockey game. Corey Perry scores on a deflected shot taken from the point. There was no chance for Gustavsson to make a save. John Mitchell gets a minor penalty but it should have been Nikolai Kulemin who was penalized.Anaheim gets one good scoring chance on the power play, but miss on a wide open net. Ducks hit the goal post with a shot from the point with two minutes left in the period.
GAME SUMMARY:
It was the “perfect storm” for the Leafs. Several players had their “A” game going. Tomas Kaberle had a career night with a goal and four assists. Niklas Hagman was right up there in the star department with the hat trick, as was Lee Stempniak with a goal and three assists. Matt Stajan had 3 assists, and Jonas Gustavsson was at times very good, and at other times was very lucky. The Leafs were able to take advantage of a lazy Anaheim team that gave Toronto 3 two man advantage goals, and 5 power play goals in total. This may have been the worst Ducks game coach Randy Carlyle has ever witnessed. Anaheim took 45 minutes in penalties while the Leafs accumulated 31 minutes.