The Maple Leafs endured the first loss of 2012 at the hands of their nemeses from Buffalo, as the desperate Sabres jumped out to a two goal lead less than five minutes into the first period, on a fluky goal by Matt Ellis that deflcted off the skate of defenseman Cody Franson and a long wrist shot from Paul Gaustad that went through the legs of Carl Gunnarsson and past goaltender Jonas Gustavsson on the short side.
Toronto was able to draw even by the end of the first period with goals from Mikhail Grabovski and Joey Crabb and had a number of chances to take the lead due to some questionable calls from the referees, but their second ranked power play was unable to convert on three chances with the man advantage.
Buffalo scored the winning goal late in the middle frame, as the Leafs were unable to gain control off a faceoff win and sniper Thomas Vanek fed a pass from behind the net to a waiting Jason Pominville, who snapped the puck quickly past Gustavsson.
Ryan Miller made 24 saves for Buffalo and earned his 26th career victory against Toronto, more than any other team in the NHL.
The Leafs will not make any lineup changes tonight, as they face the Eastern Conference leading New York Rangers at the ACC, in the first of a five game home stand.
The games against Buffalo and New York on consecutive nights seemed to be an opportunity to get James Reimer back into the lineup, as Coach Ron Wilson usually plays each of his goalies in back to back situations, but he opted to stick with the hot “Monster”, who had won four consecutive games and two shutouts, rather than with the presumptive number one goaltender, who had four victories against the Sabres in 2011.
Starting Gustavsson against New York was expected, since he played well against the Broadway Blueshirts in two 4-2 victories at Madison Square Garden earlier in the season, but with another back-to-back situation not coming until the home-and-home with the Islanders on the 23rd-24th, the question is whether Reimer will get a chance to play once in the month of January.
The members of Leafs Nation are likely not to care much who starts in goal as long as the team keeps winning, but there are long term ramifications to the current situation. Gustavsson is in the last year of his two year, $2.7 Million deal, while Reimer just signed a three year, $5.4 Million contract last July.
Gustavsson has shown flashes of being the goaltender that the Leafs thought they were getting 2 ½ years ago, with a couple four game winning streaks, while Reimer has not played with any consistency since colliding with Brian Gionta last October.
Leafs management may need more time to make a proper evaluation of what they have in Reimer before the Monster has a chance to walk in July.
GM Brian Burke stated this week that there have been no discussions of contract extension with the 27 year old native of Danderyd, Sweden’s representatives and with the top free agent netminders in July being Josh Harding, Brian Elliott and Tomas Vokoun, he appears to be well positioned to earn a significant raise and better opportunity to play more with another NHL team.
If Gustavsson continues to play most nights, as a hot Reimer did in the second half last year, do the Leafs try to sign the Monster for another two or three years, do they just let the season play out and let him walk or do they try to get something for him at the deadline?
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