FanHouse VesaToskala

It's officially the offseason, meaning the time is right to look into the future. We begin our division-by-division preview of the potential wheeling and dealing with the Northeast Division.

Brian Burke begins his rebuild of the Toronto Maple Leafs, Dany Heatley wants out of Ottawa and just what is Boston going to do with Phil Kessel and a limited amount of salary cap space?

Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals certainly didn't disappoint, as the Penguins and Hurricanes took part in an up-and-down track meet while both goalies put on a clinic in net. In the end, Marc-Andre Fleury was just a touch better than Cam Ward, while Phillipe Boucher's power play goal with just over eight minutes to play in regulation proved to be the game-winner in Pittsburgh's 3-2 win.

The Penguins came out smoking in the first period, overwhelming the Hurricanes with an offensive barrage that was highlighted by Miroslav Satan and Evgeni Malkin beating Ward just 80 seconds apart to stake the Penguins out to an early 2-0 lead. For Satan, it was his first goal in the NHL since March 1.

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Red Wings 4, Sharks 1: In the fourth -- and final -- regular season installment of Western Conference Finals Preview '09, Detroit picked up a 4-1 win over San Jose on Wednesday night. Henrik Zetterberg scored a pair of goals in the win, including a shorthanded marker early in the second period to give the Wings a commanding 3-0 lead.

Marian Hossa and Ville Leino also scored for Detroit, while Ty Conklin turned aside 34-of-35 shots in net. The loss snaps San Jose's four game winning streak, while the two teams split the season series.

Saturday was hockey day in Canada, and the premier game on the schedule was Mats Sundin's highly anticipated return to Toronto, the city he called home for 13 years.

After refusing to waive his no-trade clause at last year's deadline, Sundin became an unrestricted free agent in the offseason, and following a lengthy soap opera filled with self-imposed deadlines as to where he would play this season, he finally agreed to a contract with the Vancouver Canucks. With Vancouver making its first trip to Toronto with Sundin, the game came down to him in the final round of a shootout.

Thanks to a pair of goals from Matt Ellis, the Buffalo Sabres ended Boston's 10-game winning streak with a 4-2 victory at TD Banknorth Garden on Saturday afternoon. The loss not only snaps Boston's 10-game winning streak, it also ended a 14-game home winning streak, while also giving the Bruins their sixth regulation loss of the season.

Ellis opened the scoring for the Sabres just three minutes into regulation, while Thomas Vanek added his 26th goal of the season just two minutes later.

After Phil Kessel cut the deficit in half with his 24th goal of the season, Ellis added his second goal of the game early in the second period to score what proved to be the game-winner. Paul Gaustad added his fourth goal of the year for the Sabres, while Ryan Miller turned aside 29 shots in net.

The win for Buffalo, combined with Pittsburgh's loss to Florida, moved the Sabres into the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

For the most part, Jason Blake has been a rather large free agent bust for the Toronto Maple Leafs. After signing a five-year, $20 million deal with Toronto prior to the 2007 season, Blake scored only 15 goals for Toronto a season ago, and has been a healthy scratch on more than one occasion this season. On Tuesday, Blake scored the game-winning goal in a shootout in rather spectacular fashion -- shown above -- giving the Leafs a 3-2 win over New Jersey.

It's Toronto's third win a row, while the Devils drop their second straight.

After Mike Rupp gave New Jersey a 1-0 lead in the first period, the Leafs received a pair of second period goals from Jeremy Williams and Nik Antropov, before Zach Parise netted a power play goal with 20 seconds to play in the period, tying the game.

Vesa Toskala stopped 25 shots in the win, while also turning aside 3-of-4 shots in the shootout. Scott Clemmensen started for New Jersey, surrendering two goals in regulation on 27 shots.

I don't know what's been happening across the NHL the past two nights, but it's almost as if everyone jumped into a time machine (perhaps a DeLorean) and traveled back to 1985. Have you seen some of these scores? I'm talking 9-2, 8-5, 6-5, 7-3. It's crazy, like somebody went into the locker rooms across the league and shrunk down the goalie pads, or something.

One night after the Penguins steamrolled the Islanders to the tune of 9-2, and four different players across the league registered hat tricks, the goal-scoring barrage continued on Friday. Let's start in Newark, where the Devils outscored the Rangers, 8-5, in a game that had to be played with empty nets.

Midway through the second period, New Jersey was sitting with a seemingly comfortable 5-1 lead, before the Rangers roared back to tie the game at the 11:18 mark of the third period, thanks to Ryan Callahan's eighth goal of the season. The Rangers actually outshot the Devils by a 16-4 margin in the third period, though, New Jersey made the best of its few opportunities, scoring on three of them. Just 11 seconds after Callahan's equalizer, Patrick Elias scored the game-winner, before Brian Gionta and Jamie Langenbrunner sealed the win.

What happens when the best team in the Eastern Conference hosts the worst team in the league? Well, you might expect a blowout, and for 40 minutes, that's exactly what you received. The Bruins scored three goals in the first ten minutes on Monday night and had to hold off a third period rally from Tampa Bay, before skating away with a 5-3 win.

Milan Lucic, Phil Kessel and Michael Ryder opened the scoring for the Bruins in the first, while Zdeno Chara added his fifth goal of the season in the second to help stake Boston to a commanding 4-1 lead.

Tampa Bay outshot the Bruins by a 15-4 margin in the third period, and picked up a pair of goals from Vincent Lecavalier and Paul Szczechura (his first career goal) before P.J. Axelson added an empty-netter to seal the win.

For the Bruins, it's their fifth consecutive win, and their 14th in the past 16 games. Actually, since starting the season 2-2-3, Boston has gone 17-2-1, which is just simply ridiculous. Tampa Bay, on the other hand, is the exact opposite, as the Lightning have been downright awful, losing eight in a row, and 15 of their past 17.

It's only a matter of time until they continue to shuffle the deck chairs.

The Minnesota Wild are probably the last team you would expect to be involved in a 6-5 game, but, hark, here we are. Paul Stastny scored a pair of goals and picked up an assist for the Avalanche, as they snapped the Wild's modest two-game winning streak on Monday night.

Minnesota goalie Niklas Backstrom had what was, perhaps, his worst night of the season, giving up six goals on 26 shots through the first two periods. He didn't come back out for the third, as Josh Harding took over and stopped all five shots he faced in the defeat.

For the Avalanche, Peter Budaj gave up five goals of his own on 17 shots, as Minnesota picked up goals from Pierre-Marc Bouchard (2), Owen Nolan, Mikko Koivu, and Brent Burns.

Bouchard scored his second goal of the game just 22 seconds into the second period, giving Minnesota a brief 3-2 lead. Just three minutes later, Stastny picked up his first, as the Avalanche would fill the net three more times in the period, ultimately chasing Backstrom from the game.

Minnesota head coach Jacques Lemaire called the first 40 minutes the worst two periods he had seen, as Colorado was not only leading 6-4, but also holding a commanding 26-12 edge in shots on goal.

Calgary's Michael Cammalleri picked up a hat trick on Thursday night, helping lead the Flames to 4-3 win in Vancouver. Jarome Iginla assisted on two of Cammalleri's goals, while Curtis Glencross picked up the game-winning goal with just under seven-minutes to play in regulation, breaking a 3-3 tie.

For Cammalleri, it was his first career hat trick, and his first multiple-goal game as a member of the Flames.

Darcy Hordichuk, Daniel Sedin and Mason Raymond scored for the Canucks, while Curtis Sanford took the loss filling in for the injured Roberto Luongo, as he surrendered four goals on 33 shots. Miikka Kiprusoff picked up the win for Calgary -- its fourth win in the past five games -- as he turned aside 27-of-30 shots.