The Toronto Maple Leafs had a different kind of Black Friday in Buffalo, as they held a lead on two separate occasions but could not put away the 30th place Sabres and lost a 3-2 overtime decision at the First Niagara Center.
Christian Ehrhoff scored the game winner 38 seconds into overtime, seconds after Toronto defenseman Paul Ranger escaped the penalty box to give Buffalo their second win under interim coach Ted Nolan, both coming at the expense of the Maple Leafs on Friday nights in front of a mostly pro-Toronto crowds.
Phil Kessel and Nikolai Kulemin scored for Toronto, who drop to 14-9-3 on the season. Matt Moulson and Luke Adam tallied for Buffalo and Ryan Miller made 22 saves for his fourth win of the season and 31st career victory over the Leafs.
James Reimer made 26 saves in his second loss this week and Toronto’s sixth consecutive road loss.
The Leafs had the better of the play in the first, outshooting the Sabres 9-7 and taking the lead as Kessel kept the puck on an odd man break and fired a wrist shot past Miller for his 14th of the season.
The direction of the game changed as the Leafs began taking penalties. Buffalo tied the game on the power-play at 7:57 of the middle frame as Ville Leino’s centering pass deflected off of Jerred Smithson’s broken stick to Moulson, who quickly fired it past Reimer.
The Leafs retook the lead on some nice work from the Trevor Smith-Jay McClement-Nikolai Kulemin line, as Smith passed the puck from behind the net over the goal to a waiting Kulemin who batted it out of mid-air past Miller for his second of the season. The Sabres tied the game once again late in the second, as Reimer gave up a juicy rebound of an Ehrhoff shot to a waiting Adam, who fired it past the Leafs goaltender for his first of the season.
The third period was played close to the vest, with Toronto’s best chance to score coming from Nazem Kadri, who took a rebound off the back boards and fired it behind Miller but off the side of the net. Ranger was called for his second holding penalty of the game with 1:32 remaining in regulation, but when James van Riemsdyk had a short-handed breakaway with just seconds left on the clock, Sabres newcomer Matt D'Agostini chased down the Leafs forward from behind and took out his legs while swiping the puck away without a call.
“Their interpretation of when they came to me and spoke to me they said that he(D’Agostini) played the puck.… head coach Randy Carlyle said. “In my mind, I didn’t think it deemed a penalty shot, but I thought it should have been a penalty for taking the player’s knees out.…
"Unless we're playing football, I don't know," van Riemsdyk said after the game. "Usually when you're in all alone and you get your legs taken out from under you, you expect something, especially when the calls have been what they were, five or six to one."
Carlyle bemoaned the fact that his team has not been enjoying good fortune in recent weeks and that they will have to fight through their difficulties to get back on track.
"The breaks aren't going our way and that's when you've got to find ways to create more," Toronto coach Randy Carlyle said. "We had a power play where we didn't get much going in the third period and we gave up a power-play goal earlier in the game."
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The final game of the Leafs three game road trip is in Montreal on Saturday, with Jonathan Bernier expected to get the start in goal.
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