Canucks 6 Leafs 1

On hockey's biggest stage, Roberto Luongo showed Saturday just what great goaltending can do.

Luongo was at his gamestealing best in Canada's socalled Centre of the Universe, keeping the Vancouver Canucks in the contest against the Toronto Maple Leafs virtually singlehandily for the first 20 minutes.

With confidence and poise, Luongo did his job and seemed to suck the life out of a frustrated Leafs team. And after a while the rest of the Canucks did theirs to beat the Leafs 61 in a game in which they were mostly outplayed.

Goaltending and special teams were the difference in this game, Vancouver going 5-for-10 with the man advantage while Toronto was 0-for-8.

Bates Battaglia had the lone reply for the Leafs (20-20-6), who heard the boos from the 19,608 fans at Air Canada Centre. Most of the ire was directed at Andrew Raycroft, the Leafs goalie really getting it from the crowd late in the game. The crowd chanted his name in mockery and gave him the Bronx cheer when he stopped the puck.

"It's heartbreaking," said Leafs captain Mats Sundin, who was so disappointed in the fan's reaction to Raycroft he was driven to use expletives. "For a guy that's played his heart out, and in my opinion, had a pretty . . . solid first half of the season . . . They had five of their goals on the power play, a 5-on-3 goal, and our specialty teams, our power play, was terrible. To me, that was the big difference."

• Andrew Raycroft now knows how Dan Cloutier must have felt during much of Clout's time in Vancouver. - Mark Zwolinski, Toronto Star
• Not surprisingly, Mats Sundin was pissed off after the game. Really pissed off. - Terry Koshan, Toronto Sun, Tim Wharsby, Globe and Mail

• Zanstrom of Waiting For Stanley is both a Canucks fan and a Leafs fan (talk about sitting on the fence). Last night was probably tough on his allegiances, but by the end of the game, he knew where it was at.
• Canucks Fangirl shares her top ten reasons why the Canucks won.
• budblog wonders about things from the Toronto side of things.

My 3 Stars of the Game

1. Roberto Luongo (VAN): Made 35 saves, including 13 (of 14 shots) in the first period when the Canucks didn't have much of their game going
2. Daniel Sedin (VAN): Three point performance (1G-2A) leaves him one point behind Henrik for team scoring lead
3. Henrik Sedin (VAN): Two more assists and now 40 for the season. He only needs 23 assists to break Andre Boudrias' franchise record of 62 assists in a single season.

Official Statistics

• Scoresheet
• Stat Sheet
• Shift Chart