Results tagged “andrewraycroft”

It's been the best of times, it's been the worst of times for the Toronto Maple Leafs; in fact, the past couple weeks have been nothing short of surreal. First, the best of times: wins against the high-flying Ottawa Senators and Montreal Canadiens, followed by a thoroughly unexpected Hockey Day in Canada victory over the league-leading Detroit Red Wings, have given the team a boost. Injured players are getting healthy. The return of the much-maligned Bryan McCabe has apparently galvanized the team's defensive corps, not to mention relegated Andy "The Cause" Wozniewski to the Toronto Marlies. Mats Sundin, meanwhile, who turns thirty-seven years old today, has fifty-eight points in fifty-seven games—not bad for a guy with a "career-threatening" injury (we'll never tire of using it against you, Steve Simmons!).

One month into the new NHL season, and this much is obvious: the Toronto Maple Leafs are a mystery, wrapped in an enigma, dressed in the league’s silly new jerseys. The Leafs are scoring more often than your younger sister, but they’re also leaking goals at a potentially historic rate. They’ve lost two games by 7–1 final scores, but they’ve also got an 8–1 win and consecutive 4–1 road victories against consensus preseason favourites (Pittsburgh and the New York Rangers). The result is that the Maple Leafs are one of the most entertaining teams in the league, even if they’re seemingly hell-bent on driving their doggedly loyal fans to drink.

It's been a strange week for Leaf Nation.

With much-maligned NHL commissioner Gary Bettman in the crowd, the Toronto Maple Leafs dropped the puck on the 2007-08 season at the Air Canada Centre last night. He was probably unable to catch a glimpse of a homemade sign halfway across the arena that read: “Bettman: ruining the NHL since 1993.”

As any hockey fan in Toronto already knows, the NHL draft took place this weekend and featured John Ferguson Jr. trading for a veteran goalie for the second straight year. The newly acquired Vesa Toskala, traded from San Jose, should provide a more stable presence in the net than Andrew Raycroft, and is projected to become the starting netminder.

I love the smell of police raid in the morning. Toronto Vice arrested 60 people in the Jane and Finch area this morning in a raid called Project Kryptic. They seized "30 kilos of cocaine, hash oil and marijuana with an estimated street value of $1 million" from the Driftwood Crips. That's actually pretty badass.

It was one of the wildest final weekends in NHL history. The Toronto Maple Leafs delivered a knockout blow to the Montreal Canadiens in one of the most electric matches in recent memory, only to have the New York Islanders break our hearts and take the final playoff spot in a shootout against the New Jersey Devils the following day.

With their 4-1 loss to the defending Stanley Cup champion Carolina Hurricanes Tuesday night, the Toronto Maple Leafs slipped back to a .500 record (19-19-6) yet again, and now sit tied for ninth place in the Eastern Conference, fighting for their playoff lives after having played more than half of their games this season. They're missing a hospital ward full of regular players due to injury (Mike Peca, Alexei Ponikarovsky, Ian White, Kyle Wellwood, Darcy Tucker, etc.). They continue to struggle with goaltending that, while decent at times, is far from superior, with neither Andrew Raycroft nor Jean-Sebastien Aubin stealing a single game for them this year. So what has general manager John Ferguson, Jr. done to shore up his team with the all-star break and stretch run looming? Well, yesterday he claimed former Leaf third/fourth-liner Travis Green (two points in seven games this year with Anaheim, 22 points in 82 games with Boston last season) off of waivers. While a noted faceoff and penalty kill specialist, Green is hardly a replacement for the likes of Tucker (19-12-31 in 39 games), Ponikarovsky (11-13-24 in 35 games) or Wellwood (9-22-31 in 35 games) on a team that even when fully healthy is still lacking offensively.

Nope, Torontoist isn't referring to the classic movie series. With Halloween just around the corner, it's a different goalie mask creating this sequence of horrors. Although it may be Friday the 27th, the number 13 represents the total amount of goals Toronto Maple Leaf netminders - mainly Andrew Raycroft - have allowed to Ottawa Senator shooters this week. Even by factoring in his day off in between, Raycroft's goals against average over those 3 days would still put him near the bottom of the NHL. Now Torontoist has been quick to jump to conclusions in the past. Granted the Leafs were off to a rather decent start this season, and it was Raycroft who was indeed leading the way. However, Tuesday's 6-2 and Thursday's 7-2 losses to their provincial rivals are an all too familiar occurance over the past couple of seasons, and surely have to serve as a reality check for Paul Maurice's club.

After the Leafs out-performed Torontoist's pre-season predictions, the real deal gets underway tonight. Despite the 3-5 record over the past two and a half weeks, the team lost a pair against Ottawa, followed by a pair against Detroit (with the Red Wings playing their "B" squad against the Leafs top unit in the second of the two games) leading in to the start of the regular season. So will they turn it around tonight? The smart money is on no. However, stranger things have happened. One thing's for certain - Goaltender Andrew Raycroft WILL continue to disappoint fans this season. The Leafs play a back-to-back set against their provincial rivals, with the first installment at the ACC tonight. What better way to get off to an 0-2 start?