Buffalo Blanks Leafs 3-0
Posted November 30, 2009 10:23 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Ryan Miller put on a pretty impressive show for the man in charge of assembling the U.S. Olympic team.
The Buffalo Sabres goaltender stopped all 38 shots he faced Monday during a 3-0 victory over Brian Burke’s Toronto Maple Leafs.
Miller has arguably been the top goaltender in the NHL this season and is a front-runner to earn the starting job for the Americans in Vancouver. This was one time Burke and Leafs coach Ron Wilson, also the U.S. Olympic coach, didn’t need him to further his case.
It was Miller’s third shutout of the season.
Tim Kennedy, Henrik Tallinder and Jochen Hecht scored for Buffalo (15-7-2). Toronto, meanwhile, was shut out for the first time all season. The Leafs record fell to 6-12-7.
Starting with Tuesday’s game in Montreal, the Leafs are embarking on an extremely busy stretch that will see them play 16 games in December. The team was nine points behind eighth-place Tampa Bay heading into play Monday and has targeted the next month as a key time to try and make up for its poor start.
“(We want to) claw our way back into the race,” said Wilson.
Miller got in the way of those plans.
Toronto raced out to a fast start, building an 8-1 shot advantage, but couldn’t beat the Sabres netminder. He stopped a couple of chances from Phil Kessel before denying Niklas Hagman from in close late in the first period.
If that wasn’t enough for Miller to get into the head of his opponents, he probably did during the second period. He stopped Matt Stajan on a dangerous rush and then stood tall as Mikhail Grabovski made a nifty move in front before extending his right pad to stop Kessel.
Kennedy then opened the scoring at 13:07 of the second period by catching Jonas Gustavsson cheating a little. The Sabers forward saw his soft shot bank off Gustavsson’s skate and into the goal.
The Leafs still entered the final 20 minutes with a chance to win the game, but thoughts of a comeback were quickly erased. Tallinder’s point shot beat Gustavsson just 20 seconds into the third and Hecht iced it with another long shot at 10:59. That was more than enough offence for Miller, who improved his record to 15-4-2 and improved his league-leading goals-against average and save percentage.
Notes: Mike Komisarek returned to the Toronto lineup after missing nine games with a torn quadricep. … Jeff Finger (lower body), Garnet Exelby and Rickard Wallin sat out for the Leafs. … Leafs defenceman Carl Gunnarsson suffered an upper-body injury in the second period and didn’t return. … Sabres forward Patrick Kaleta served the second game of his two-game suspension. … It was the second career goal for Kennedy, a Buffalo native. … Announced attendance was 19,110.
Photo by Abelimages/Getty Images
