John Tavares came up big for the Isles last night scoring two goals including the OT winner. Can he do it again tonight?
Before last night’s game, Boudreau said he was afraid of the Isles and always had been. They’re a team that can win and are hard to play against. Facing an injury riddled Ducks, the Isles did pull out a win, but it wasn’t exactly easy. They were smart enough to stay out of the box with only Nelson and Hickey taking minors. Hickey’s penalty did result in Matt Beleskey’s goal, but only because Hamonic was defending without a stick after it broke behind the net and he was out of position trying to take a stick from Boychuk.
The goal that cut the Isles lead in half energized the Ducks who gave the Isles fits peppering Halak with non-stop shots on net. Emerson Etem’s game tying goal was explained by Art Staple as such on Twitter:
Visnovsky/Hickey trapped on for overlong shift, #Isles can't clear/start leaking zone, and Etem ties it with 1:09 left in 2nd. Ugly.
Perhaps a bit of luck on the Isles part and foolishness on the Ducks, but Vatanen took a penalty in overtime for putting an elbow into Calvin deHaan’s head and Tavares saved the day with a power play goal.
Tim Jackman, ex-Isle, seemed to have an issue with Matt Martin from the very start of the game. Maybe he misses being the Isles heavy hitter. He laid out six hits to Martin’s seven so Matty Marts still leads.
Eric Boulton played a team low 7:48 of ice time with two shots, two blocked shots, one hit and one take-away. Yes, he has been working on his game. Is it enough to keep him in the line-up?
For tonight it is as Boulton will be playing but Cory Conacher gets to sit with Cizikas happily getting back in the line-up. Chad Johnson will be in net tonight in LA giving Halak a break.
Speaking of goalies; congrats to David Leggio who was the basis of a new AHL rule to keep goalies from popping off their own net when they don’t want to face an attacker coming in alone. Hey…it seemed like a good idea at the time.