NIKO MIKKOLA: Florida Panthers Dominate Leafs in Toronto, Bring 3-2 Series Lead Home

2 Comments

1. 

   @ldhorricks 8 months ago

   In an interview a while back with Joe Buck, Gretzky recalled after losing 4-0 in the Final to the Isles…I paraphrase: He was walking out of the building with Lowe and Messier having to pass the Islanders locker-room and dreading it. He said when they looked inside the locker-room they weren't spraying champagne and going wild, but rather sitting there quietly totally spent and beat up from the grind of getting there and the toll it took on them…the individual sacrifices they all made. He said that he learned in the moment what it takes be a cup winner.

   Leafs have the opportunity in real time to learn this from the team they are playing in this series…TBH they have had that opportunity to learn from Character teams in the playoffe for the past 9 years with this core group. Sure, there are players on the Leafs, (some recently added) with whom these things won’t be…or aren't lost on. But there are those on the Leafs…some of whom are the highest paid in the game…who wear the C and A on their jerseys with whom these things of character (which Gretzky was speaking of), continue to be lost on…year in and year out…Nothing is learned. Most of this team’s player salary is tied up in players who year after year come up short. But it’s where they come up short that matters most…I see it their body language, their expressions, their post game interviews. There is a disconnect, an aloofness that shows me they don’t have the character a championship team must have, especially from their best players…the players wearing the letters on their Jerseys. They love to win…but they don't look like it hurts to lose as much as others playing at this level of the sport. Berube is the right man behind the bench…he was brought in to hold players accountable…and he’s done a pretty good job with what he has to work with…but you can’t change character. Tonight, this core of players which the Leafs have stuck with for 9 years, yet again missed another opportunity to show character and fortitude…and instead are utterly destroyed in every aspect that exists in the game of hockey. But more than anything it was the effort that was so embarrassingly indicting. Florida’s top players didn’t have to be the best last night, their 3rd and 4th lines stepped and outplayed the Leafs.

   The Islanders lost year after year of heartbreaking series, leading up to their game 6 OT final win over the Flyers in 1980 and raising the cup for the first time. Every year they learned a little more…every year the pain hurt a lot more…every year they came a little closer. That Islanders team had in those years of playoff losses, what this Leafs team lacks…heart and character. The Isles of that era never lost a game or series for lack of effort…each and every player left everything on the ice…you didn’t play on an Al Arbour/ Bill Torey if your guts weren’t spilled on the ice every game. I remember Bossy saying in his (cup winning) post-game interview, how that team learned something from every one of those gut wrenching series losses…and the pain that came with them. The Leafs, or at least the core of players who have been around for 9 years clearly have not. Shanahan was a character player who left his guts on the ice…but he can’t put together a team that embodies that character.

   To think in 2016 the Leaf’s could have drafted the kind of player that leads teams to winning Stanley Cups…they could have had Tkachuk.

2. 

   @olgazgureanu4987 8 months ago

   В этом ПО точно зажигают финны……красава Миккола…….защита играла очень хорошо, но не идеально, оставили Боба без сухаря……поздравляю с шикарной победой коты!