Game 7s to remember: Leafs win Battle of Ontario again in 2004
The NHL should be deep into postseason action, but with the start of the 2019-20 playoffs delayed, theScore's hockey editors are picking their favorite Game 7s from years past.
Today, we look back at the final installment of the Battle of Ontario, wherein the Toronto Maple Leafs bounced the archrival Ottawa Senators from the playoffs for the fourth time in five seasons.
The setup
The Maple Leafs and Senators met in the postseason three years in a row from 2000-02. After a year off, they crossed paths again in the first round in 2004. Toronto entered the playoffs as the 4-seed with 103 points, a single point clear of Ottawa in the standings.
The Senators came into the series as the stronger team on paper, ranking first in goals for through the regular season and ninth in goals against. Ottawa had a deep roster led by the likes of Marian Hossa, Daniel Alfredsson, Zdeno Chara, and a pair of dynamic young forwards in Jason Spezza and Martin Havlat.
The Leafs were a veteran club through and through, built around captain Mats Sundin, Gary Roberts, and Alexander Mogilny up front while a 38-year-old Ed Belfour tended goal.
The series
The Senators won Game 1 on the road, but the Maple Leafs responded with two consecutive victories to take a 2-1 lead. Ottawa won a crucial Game 4 in which Toronto was dealt a major blow, as Sundin suffered a lower-body injury that caused him to miss the remainder of the series. The Maple Leafs went on to win Game 5 without their leader thanks to a 21-save shutout from Belfour. After the contest, Alfredsson guaranteed his club would win Game 6 at home and ultimately take the series.
The Sens captain came through on the first part of his promise, as a baby-faced Mike Fisher scored in double overtime of Game 6 to send the series back to Toronto for a winner-take-all showdown.
The game
The Star(s): Maple Leafs forward Joe Nieuwendyk had the most memorable performance of the game, burying two first-period goals (we'll get to those later) to provide Toronto an early and insurmountable lead.
Even though Toronto was in the driver's seat for nearly the entire game, Belfour was fantastic in goal, stopping 36-of-37 Senators shots. After Ottawa scored 22 seconds into the second period to make it 3-1 and gain a glimmer of hope, Eddie the Eagle was there to stop the ensuing barrage with several key saves.
The X-factor(s): The Maple Leafs' opening goal came from the unlikeliest of sources, as depth winger Chad Kilger tallied his first goal of the playoffs just over six minutes into the first period. The veteran winger had only three goals that season, but he was in the right spot to bury a perfect feed from another rare offensive contributor: enforcer Tie Domi.
Kilger went on to add the primary assist on Toronto's key insurance marker in the third period. As they say, anything can happen in a Game 7.
Key moment: Nieuwendyk's aforementioned two first-period goals are unquestionably the lasting memory from this game. The eventual Hall of Famer notched his first less than two minutes after Kilger opened the scoring, fooling Ottawa goaltender Patrick Lalime with a soft wrister from the left boards.
Oddly enough, Nieuwendyk got the same opportunity on a nearly identical rush in the final minute of the opening frame. He squeaked another one past Lalime, and the game might as well have been over. Even legendary announcer Bob Cole was dumbfounded, shouting "What's going on?!" as a raucous Air Canada Centre crowd basked in the commanding 3-0 advantage for their Leafs.
The highlight
Sixteen years later, these goals still make no sense.
Lalime was pulled after allowing three goals on 11 shots in a performance that tarnished an otherwise impressive playoff resume. He had managed a .926 save percentage and 1.77 goals-against average across 41 postseason games, but that outing in Toronto was the final playoff start of his career.
"Patrick didn't have a good night," Senators head coach Jacques Martin said following the loss. "We're not going to hide that."
The fallout
The Leafs were eliminated in six games by the Philadelphia Flyers the following round. After that, Toronto and Ottawa went in opposite directions.
The 2004-05 season was canceled due to lockout, but before the league returned for the 2005-06 campaign, the Senators made a major splash by trading for Dany Heatley. He scored 50 goals in each of his first two seasons in Ottawa, helping the team become a powerhouse in the Eastern Conference.
The Senators won the division that season with 113 points, then advanced to the Stanley Cup Final the following year. The top line of Heatley, Alfredsson, and Spezza was one of the league's best.
Meanwhile, the Leafs plummeted after the lockout. Their lineup was too old, and after they barely missed the playoffs in the first two years of the new NHL, things went further downhill.
From the 2007-08 season through the 2011-12 campaign, the Leafs maxed out at 85 points. The club wasn't developing players, and different management teams made a variety of questionable decisions without ever committing to an actual rebuild. Toronto didn't make the playoffs again until 2013, the lockout-shortened season that featured a 48-game schedule.
More pain followed, but the Leafs have been a real playoff contender since 2016. However, they're still looking for their first series win since ousting the Senators in 2004.