Like a recurring nightmare, the Maple Leafs had to suffer through another tough loss at the hands of divisional foe Boston Bruins. It would be just their luck that the B's first line of Milan Lucic, David Krejci and Nathan Horton would relieve themselves of their pointless streaks just in time for their game against each other.
Lucic had two goals, Horton had two assists, and Krejci had one goal and two assists totaling a seven point night for the struggling first line. Prior to tonight, Lucic hadn't scored in eight games (last one was on November 12 against the Sabres) and Krejci hadn't netted one since November 7 game against the Islanders.
Not only did the Bruins first line peak at the right time, but the Maple Leafs, who had dominated the last three teams they faced, suddenly looked shaken after the Bruins captain Zdeno Chara scored the third goal of the game.
The Leafs actually started the scoring in this game with the help of Mikhail Grabovski. Rich Peverley was sent to the sin bin early for high sticking and Toronto took full advantage of it. With just under 30 seconds left to go with the man advantage, Grabovski backhanded a shot over Tim Thomas and put the Leafs up 1-0 early on.
The Bruins struck back later in the period, as Lucic netted his first goal of the game, also on the power play. Carl Gunnarsson went for holding, and Joffrey Lupul went for boarding within 45 seconds of each other, which gave the Bruins a 5-on-3. Four seconds after Lupul left the penalty box, Lucic took his shot and put it in the back of the net.
Then the second period came and the Bruins were able to open up the game a bit and score two more goals. Once again, after Krejci slid the puck past the leg pad of Leafs goaltender Jonas Gustavsson to make it 2-1, Toronto came back and scored at the hands of Lupul. Phil Kessel had the primary assist, but that was the only point of the night for him.
Once again, at the fifteen minute mark in the second, Chara wristed a puck to give the Bruins a 3-2 lead going into the second intermission.
The momentum continued into the third when Benoit Pouliot took a shot from one knee in front of the net, and, through traffic beat Gustavsson for his third goal of the year. After that, another goal from Lucic and an empty netter from Brad Marchand resulted in a 6-3 win--the Bruins third win over Toronto this year.
The Bruins were without a single penalty in the second and third periods, and put up 40 shots against Gustavsson. Tim Thomas faced 37 shots and finished his November 9-0-0.
Boston completed it's month 12-0-1, accumulating 25 of 26 possible points. The only point lost was against Detroit when the Bruins ended up losing in the shootout.
The B's will have their second game of the home-and-home series against Toronto on Saturday.