You don’t pull on Superman’s cape. You don’t spit into the wind. You don’t pull the mask off the old Lone Ranger, and you don’t mess around with Ryan Miller. Or, at least don’t broadcast to the world in your pre-game interviews that you’re going to run the best goalie in the NHL. Ask Matt Stajan, Colton Orr and the rest of the Miserable Leafs. Bringing a knife to a gun fight for the tenth straight time against Buffalo. Tisk tisk.
Miller was full on hot after the 3-2 Buffalo win. He was less than impressed with the leafs and their crease tactics.
“You know, the contact is just…ridiculous. To have it in your pre-game media.. to talk about it.. Just do it. Don’t tell me that you’re going to get in my face And then, if you’re going to cross check me in the back of the head, take the punch like a man. I don’t get it… they just want to get me fired up. I just don’t really like the way they (the Leafs) address that stuff , If they wanna get in my face that’s one thing, if they wanna just play hockey that’s another. If you’re going to come around my crease and try to make it difficult for me, just don’t announce it…”
WHY give Miller added motivation to lay a beat down on you? These 09/10 Leafs are gluttons for punishment, and Miller made them pay for their transgressions!
Miller’s dauber was firmly up, as he held court with the media horde congregating in his locker stall after Buffalo’s tenth straight win against the Leafs in Buffalo on Friday night. He had every right to be pissed off at matt Stajan who carelessly combed the back of Miller’s hair with his composite pea shooter twelve minutes into the game. Miller took exception to Stajan's cranial blow and answered by popping his attacker in the face with his red hot catching glove. Stajan reacted with the worst acting performance I've seen in years. He pulled a Greg Louganis dive, with nary a splash. Worthy of a 10.0 grade by Olympic standards. Stajan crumpled to the ice as if he’d been felled by Dirty Harry’s .357 magnum. Embarrassing that its come down to this in Toronto.
The Leafs called their shot and they could not back it up. They fired 50 shots at Miller and only two tinkled the twine. When will Ron Wilson and the Leafs learn? Its best not to mess with Miller, both physically and psychologically. The guy is no dummy. He's a bright guy with keen instincts. He's smarter than most coaches and easily outscores NHL cement heads on intelligence quotient tests.
I've been covering Miller for five season's now, and this is by far my most favourite quote of his, and there have been some gems over the years, however, this one cuts to the bone of teh opponent.
" I really don't like them (the Leafs). They are a rival. They're in our division. They constantly talk about how they are gonna rough me up every night. I love nothing more than to get a win against them, and, send them an hour and a half on their way".
Miller has spanked the Leafs the last nine times that he's played them.
****
"He's definitely my vote for Rookie of the Year, based on the way he played tonight", Luke Schenn told me after the game. "He" is Tyler Myers, and "he" is Schenn's former Kelowna D partner and close confidante.
Myers had just mulched the leafs for two powerplay goals and one powerplay assist.
"A young Dman like that who can skate as well as he can, AND, he quarterbacks the powerplay in key situations... you know, he's done well for himself and its good to see with a good buddy like that and a good teammate having such great success".
I asked Schenn if he recalls if Myers was that great a skater in Kelowna. "He always skated well, but now he's got that push.... its that long stride. He's gotten to be so much stronger. He's was definitely flying out there".
Schenn's response to my assertion that Myers is becoming a one man powerplay unit:
"They definitely ran into the right penalty kill tonight".
****
Elliotte Freedman from HNIC and I had a friendly deabte while we waited for Ron Wilson to blow off steam before his postgame presser. "Freege" thought that Tim Kennedy's PPG was a bit of a knuckler that fooled Toskala. I maintained that TK got all of it and blasted a laserbeam past the Tronna goalie.
Kennedy set the record straight for me in the Buffalo room:
"The puck was a little in front of me I tried to set my feet.. I got all of it and i just toe picked, and I thought it went in but I wasn;t sure because I was on the ice. when the red light went on, thats when I knew it".
TK beat Toskala glove high, short side, from the halfwall one one knee, no less.
How many times did you take that shot in your driveway with a tennis ball, I asked him.
"A lot. With him (Toskala), he like to go down, so I had to go high with it. The key to that goal was the big shot from up top.. Toskala had to come from middle to side and there was just a little hole. I was shooting high, but probably not there, but thats where it went in".
Kennedy missed out on a second goal of the game as he Vanek and Grier created a jail break in front of Tokala when 26 fed 25. Toskala made the initial save but the puck came back through the crease for Kennedy to tap in.
I asked Kennedy what happened there as the loose puck came to rest on Toskala's post.
"Thats one play where I wish my stick was two inches longer", he quipped.
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