In Toronto Saturday, the Los Angeles Kings were skunked in a 5-0 rout at the hands of the Maple Leafs.
Jonathan Bernier picked up his first shutout of the season and made 26 saves to get the win.
Jonathan Bernier stopped 26 in shutout – file photo by Brent Clark
“I would say real good for Bernie, and as good as it was for Bernie it was better for the Leafs just because it hadn’t gone so good for Bernie,” Leafs coach Mike Babcock said. “It’s got to be unbelievably hard on you mentally to get put through the ringer. He has been down to the minors, he watched (Garret) Sparks play ahead of him. It’s not easy. I don’t care what walk of life you are in or what you do, when someone takes your shift, takes your job, takes your position, it’s hard for you. You’ve got to decide why you play the game. You play the game because of the joy in it and when the joy leaves you it’s hard to be as good as you are capable of being.”
Michael Grabner and Leo Komarov each had two goals and Byron Froese added a late goal for Toronto.
“I have had a tough time, but I have been saying if you stick to the program and you work hard at one point you’ll get rewarded,” Bernier said. “I thought tonight it felt really good, but at the same time the guys played really good. That’s not an easy team and we came out and battled and played a tight game.”
Jhonas Enroth took the loss on 29 saves.
“I don’t think we were making it hard enough on Bernie,” LA’s Dustin Brown said. “He saw a lot of the pucks coming in, and I think we didn’t get in on the forecheck well enough tonight. We had a lot of dump-ins and then we were forced to backcheck. When we’re on our game that doesn’t happen.”
The Kings finished their road trip with a 3-2-1 record and fell to 20-10-2 on the season.
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