OTHL -- The Montreal Canadiens took out the Boston Bruins in round one, the team that won the President's Trophy. Tonight they shut the high powered Devils offense down as they won 1-0 in the first game of the second round. The goal was scored 15 minutes into the game, when Mike Modano got the puck to Barret Jackman (1) who joined the attack and scored his first playoff goal. Richard Zedink also picked up a point on the lone goal in this game. Outside of the goal, the New Jersey Devils where the better team through the game. New Jersey won the shots 34 to 22, but Jose Theodore played his best game in the post season and got his first shutout in this years playoff. But while the Devils fired 34 shots on net, top scorers like Patrik Elias, Simon Gagne and David Legwand where held to 4 shots in total. Zhitnik and Kozlov where the two Devils players that got away most shots on net with 4 each. New Jersey will have to re-group and hope that there top names can get some offense going in game two, or the Devils will face a up hill battle in the second round.
Against Philadelphia in the deciding game 7, Toronto had 3 powerplay goals on 6 powerplays. Tonight the Leafs where unable to get any powerplay goals, but they still won 4-0 against the Florida Panthers on away ice. Alexei Ponikarovsky (2) opend the scoring in the first period. Then in the second period Owen Nolan woke up and scored twice, his 2nd and 3rd goal in this years post-season. And before the period was over, Peter Nedved (4) had scored the Leafs fourth goal for the night. The Panthers tried to get back into the game, by the Leafs defense lead by Adam Foote and Bryan McCabe keept the pucks out of the net, with some help from Ed Belfour who made 30 saves to earn his first shutout this post-season.
PLAYER(S) OF THE NIGHT: Jose Theodore (Montreal) & Ed Belfour (Toronto) earned a shutout each in the first game of the second round. Theodore had 34 saves against New Jersey, while Belfour made 30 saves against Florida.