The Weekly Leaflet: March 19th, 2013

oh, hey.
you're back here?

well, i guess it's time for one of those leaf-talk things we do, eh?

forgive my general apathy, it seems to be arriving right in time for the annual leafs' mid-season slump.
wonder if there's some crossover there.

Just beyond the halfway point of the season, the Leafs face off for three matchups this week - two against southeastern wonders the winnipeg jets, and another against some penguin guys from pittsburgh? word on the street is they're pretty good.

with such a workload, one would hope for pretty good results for the boys in blue, right?

oh well.
just how bad did it get?

poor phil "the fill" has taken to camouflage on the streets to prevent

encounters with angry "leaf fans"

hit the jump and we'll talk about it. i'd advise drinking, but hey - it's not like we're watching an actual leaf game, right?

The Weekly Leaflet: Maple Leafs at Senators, February 23 2013 and the week ahead.

Okay, I've gone ahead and done it. For the time being this segment has been given a name, apparently, that name being "The Weekly Leaflet", courtesy rasiqra/revulva.

Today's edition features another round of the Battle of Ontario with the Leafs facing off against The Sens, on the road, sort of.

The Buds headed into Ottawa to cap off a fairly eventful week on their schedule.

Starting the week of in Florida, the Leafs downed the Panthers by a score of 3-0 (continuing their shutout ways) before heading into Tampa Bay and playing a much better Lightning team (better than who? well, the leafs and the panthers I'd wager). The Leafs laid a bit of a stinker in this one, with Scrivens pulled late in the game and the team ultimately falling by a score of 4-2. Two nights later, they were back home in Toronto, facing the Ruff-less Sabres, who they trounced 3-1 on the back of a big 2 goal night from JVR.

tap, tap, tap-a-roo

The Ottawa Senators record was one win better than the Leafs, as they beat most of the Atlantic Division this week, dropping the Isles, Rangers and Devils since we saw them last.

This made for many questions heading into the evening:

-how will each team respond to their litany of injuries?
-why in the hell is this Alfredsson guy still playing ? (yea, yea, great player, whatever)
-which Ben Scrivens will show up ? Back to back shutouts Ben Scrivens, or four goals on 16 shots Ben Scrivens?

I know you're clearly very excited to find out, as there's certainly no way for you to have gleaned this knowledge before, so hit the jump and let's see what happened

Recap: Senators at Leafs - Feb, 16 2013, and the week ahead.

Welcome back for another preview/recap of the Maple Leafs' recent schedule, a little something I may start referring to as "the Weekly Leaflet." Note: I said may. I totally may not. Double Note: sticktap to rasiqra/revulva for the idea.

The Leafs had a relatively easy week this time around (especially for a shortened season) playing only 3 games in the last 7 nights.

The week started off on a mixed note, with the Philadelphia Flyers in town for the first meeting of these teams this season, and consequently since the Schenn/JVR trade. Things started off shaky with a rebound from a point shot by the aforementioned Schenn resulting in a Wayne Simmonds goal just 38 seconds in. From there, things were essentially all Toronto after Captain Phaneuf tied the game late in the first. Toronto cruised on to a 5-2 victory, featuring this dandy by JVR.

yeah, that's Luke Schenn who slides away at the end.

The bad news is, however, that James Reimer left the game slightly before the halfway mark with what would turn out to be a strained MCL in his left knee. Ben Scrivens came in in relief, and ended up stopping 32 of 33 shots, looking shaky but dependable.

Two nights later, the Leafs were in Carolina and laid a complete egg against a Hurricanes team playing their first game at home after a long road-trip, starting their back up goaltender Dan Ellis. The game started out with some rough stuff between Colton Orr (who Randy Carlyle seems to be viewing as the second coming of Darren McCarty these days) and Kevin Westgarth before remaining incredibly boring for a period and a half. Quite possibly the most boring game I've seen this year. The second period featured all 4 goals in the game, with Joe Corvo striking first for the 'Canes, Kadri retaliating for the Leafs before Jussi Jokinen and Jordan Staal put it away for Carolina, downing the Leafs 3-1.

Despite this clunker, the Buds headed into Saturday night's game with a record of 3-1 in their last four games. Unfortunately, the injury cloud loomed heavily over this game for both teams, with Gunnarson, Lupul, Frattin and Reimer injured for the Maple Leafs, and notable Sens Jason Spezza and Erik Karlsson on the shelf (the last due to a nasty achilles tendon cut.)

Would the Leafs be able to put the stops to a losing skid before it started?
Would Krusty the Klown Daniel Alfredsson be booed mercilessly by the ACC faithful?
Which team's injury troubles would pose the most trouble?

Well click on through and we'll talk about how the Leafs fared against the SNES

artist rendition of "sens" third jersey wordmark.