The Leafs trudge into the stripper capital of Canada for their game against the Habs after an excellent road performance resulted in a 3-2 loss. Be sure to check out tonight's installment of 5 Questions With... that features the lads at Four Habs Fans who almost made it until game-time without resorting to insults by rote. When the Leafs pull out a win you can chuckle at the insane expectations that are already building in Montreal. Don't they know that sort of thing is reserved for the off-season.
Here's your half-terrifying/half-soothing stat for tonight's game: The Habs' powerplay is # 1 in the league with a 30.9% rate of effectiveness. Thankfully it's only 4th best at home (26.5%). Unfortunately, the Leafs are 21st in the NHL (79.8%) overall and 12th on the road (85.7%) to continue the trend of competent hockey being played away from the paying and braying fans of the Centre of the Universe. At least the travelling fans will get to see some real hockey being played (I still have tickets to five more games. Does MLSE do refunds?) and then a night of full contact dancing (note: full contact dancing may or may not occur in an actual gentlemen's club).
I am trying to run a prediction game (which is turning out to be ridiculously hard) so put in your guesses for who will score take the first shot, get the first penalty, and score the first goal. I'll keep a running tally of the results in the right sidebar. For the Devils' game the winning predictions were: Shot - Antropov, Penalty - Gill, and Goal - Steen. This is also getting tracked in the sidebar but Evening News Team and I are drawing blanks.
As always, your thoughts throughout the game are much appreciated in the comments. Each period and overtime/shootout gets their own section so just reply to the relevant section's main post. You need to set up an account to comment so register and share your thoughts.
Note: I've added a poll to the Devils' recap for the player of the game so scroll down and vote.