Maple Leafs 4 – Senators 0
Leafs also won shootout 2-1
Sheldon Keefe made it blatantly obvious that this was a show me game and Michael Bunting was the man who rung that bell.
A look at the goals:
Leafs 1 – Sens 0
Kampf with another goal due to solid positioning and having his eyes on the puck. Dahlstrom shoots it from the point, the puck gets interrupted on the way to the net. Kampf who has been tracking the puck, unlike the defender, finds it and throws in through Gustavsson’s wickets.
Leafs 2 – Sens 0
Ho-Sang stretched to try and collect the puck for a Grade A scoring chance alone in front, but the puck was out of reach. He quickly looks back and throws a BEAUTIFUL feed to Bunting, with his stick on the ice, and he buries it five hole for a Power Play goal.
Bunting started the play winning the puck off of the boards, Kase with a slick feed to Ho-Sang that just missed but lead to the goal.
Leafs 3 – Sens 0
Leafs on the Power Play again. Sandin throws it on net from the point, Bunting with a great tip that completely redirects the puck to the opposite side of the net. No chance for Gustavsson.
Leafs 4 – Sens 0
Amadio putting in work behind the Sens net, breaks away from his man to find Bunting. Bunting has found himself a nice pocket of open Ice, and receives the pass with a good 5 minutes to spare.
Bunting quick and tidy snaps it into the far top corner for the Hatty.
The Leafs dominated this game, Mrazek looked solid. He was only beat on the fake shoot-out, I am sure that pissed him off. Kampf, Sandin, Ho-Sang, Robertson, Amadio and Liljegren had great games in my eye’s.
Hopefully game 2 against Ottawa will see similar lines and give these guys another chance to really stand above the rest.
But the real Golden Boy was Michael Bunting.
This kid.
He was throwing his body around all night, all though one hit led to a Roughing call (Is it terrible I kind of liked the hit). He appeared to get under the skin of several Sens, most notably Scott Sabourin (the brief leaf). Sabourin was fuming as the faceoff circle pre-puck drop at Bunting.
Not to mention the kid got a Hattrick. His third goal was something real special for me.
We have hard working players, we have defensive minded players, we have fast players. What the top line needs is players with FINISH. This was a give me goal for Bunting, but the poise and shot strongly suggest this kid can finish.
And that ability to find open ice!
Michael Bunting is definitely deserving of a shot on the top-line. I love Hyman, but he would still flub 70% of the chances gifted to him by Mathews or Marner. Increasing that to even a 50% success rate would transform this team.
The Leafs are back at Ottawa Monday October 4th, cuts are coming!
It’s October, buy pumpkin pie! Enjoy the fall!