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Phaneuf To Have Hearing; New Leaf Buzz

December 9, 2013, 11:42 AM ET [1245 Comments]
Mike Augello
Toronto Maple Leafs Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
Listen to the latest edition of Leaf Buzz with CTV’s Norman James and myself discussing the Leafs recent struggles:



In spite of the playing their third game in four nights, there was reason for the Toronto Maple Leafs to have some optimism that they could defeat the Boston Bruins in an unusual Sunday night home game at Air Canada Center.

The club had won two games in a row over Dallas and Ottawa, goaltenders James Reimer and Jonathan Bernier were coming off sparkling 40+ save performances and the Leafs faced a Bruins club who limped into Toronto after battles against Montreal and Pittsburgh left them without five regulars (Adam McQuaid, Johnny Boychuk, Loui Eriksson, Shawn Thornton and Chris Kelly) in the lineup and were starting backup goalie Chad Johnson, but all those factors seemed to melt away, as did the Leafs in a 5-2 loss to Boston.

Toronto played an effective opening twenty minutes, limiting Boston to a paltry 10 shots on goal and scoring the only goal, as Peter Holland cashed in the rebound of a Jake Gardiner shot for his third goal of the season.

The tide of the game changed early in the second as Toronto’s struggling penalty killing yielded the tying and go-ahead goals after winger Carter Ashton took a careless delay of game penalty and defenseman Carl Gunnarsson was called for holding just 54 seconds apart. Boston’s Carl Soderberg and rookie Torey Krug scored power play markers to give the Bruins a lead they would never relinquish.

"The first period, we seemed like we had our legs, we were doing a lot of things," coach Randy Carlyle said after the game. "Then we take the one penalty and it seemed their goal kind of flattened us and the next thing you know we're killing again right away. And it was bang-bang, all of a sudden they scored two goals and the life went out of our hockey club."

Boston was playing even more short-handed in the middle frame, as sophomore Dougie Hamilton failed to emerge from the locker room after suffering a lower body injury, but their depleted numbers did not phase them in the slightest, as call up Kevan Miller’s point shot beat a screened Bernier to extend the lead to 3-1.

Toronto attempted to stage a comeback as Jay McClement converted his own rebound just 37 seconds into the third for his first of the season, but their potent power play could not capitalize early in the period on two opportunities as the Bruins had done in the second.
Bernier did his best to keep the Leafs in the game throughout the third, as he robbed

Boston’s Jordan Caron late in regulation, but Boston delivered the killing blow with four minutes remaining in regulation, as coach Claude Julien sent out his top line of Milan Lucic, David Krejci and Jarome Iginla against the weary unit Phil Kessel-James van Riemsdyk-Nazem Kadri, who all played more than 23 minutes. Lucic beat Kessel to a loose puck, charged into the Toronto zone past Leafs captain Dion Phaneuf and fed Iginla in front of the net for his sixth of the season.

Phaneuf reacted poorly to the goal, as moments later with the puck behind the Boston net, he hit Miller from behind, knocking the defenseman for a loop. The Leafs captain puzzlingly was not assessed a minor penalty for the hit, but after the game was informed that he will have a phone hearing with NHL Director of Player Safety Brendan Shanahan on Tuesday.

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The Ottawa Sun’s Bruce Garrioch reports that Leafs GM Dave Nonis is scrambling to find help up the middle. In spite of getting some offense from Nazem Kadri, Jay McClement and Peter Holland in the last three games and getting an unexpected contribution from Trevor Smith, Toronto will likely be without Tyler Bozak for the rest of December and Dave Bolland well into the New Year.

With the NHL Board of Governors meetings in California this week, there may be some movement in the trade market in advance of the December 19th Holiday trade moratorium.

Garrioch referenced discussions between the Leafs and Dallas Stars earlier in the year regarding center Vern Fiddler, but any rekindling of those talks are unlikely since the 33-year-old veteran was injured in the Stars 5-1 victory over Philadelphia on the weekend.

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Rookie blueliner Morgan Rielly sat his third straight game Sunday, increasing the possibility of the 19-year-old being loaned to Team Canada for the 2014 IIHF World Juniors in Sweden later this month. The Leafs are currently carrying eight defensemen and may need to play Rielly if Phaneuf is suspended for a significant amount of games, but with the recall of veteran John-Michael Liles and the factor of not wanting the rookie to exceed 40 games this season, the writing appears to be on the wall.

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