TORONTO — David Ayres was sitting in the stands with his wife at Scotiabank Arena when Hurricanes goalie James Reimer went down with an injury.
The emergency netminder for Saturday’s game against the Maple Leafs, Ayers left his seat and got half-dressed into his gear on the off chance something also happened to Carolina backup Petr Mrazek.
Midway through the second period, Ayres was by himself in the bowels of the building when his phone started to buzz. What he didn’t realize was Mrazek had been hurt in a scary collision with Toronto forward Kyle Clifford and was down on the ice.
Next thing the 42-year-old Zamboni driver by day knew, he was walking down the tunnel and into the spotlight.
And not long after, he had an improbable first NHL win.
Ayres allowed goals on the first two shots he faced before settling down and stopping the next eight directed his way in a suffocating defensive performance from his new teammates as Carolina picked up a stunning 6-3 victory over Toronto.
“I had a couple of text messages that told me to get in there,” Ayres said in front a throng of reporters. “I hadn’t seen the footage (of Mrazek’s injury). I was in the media room by myself and a guy came in and said, ‘Get going. Get ready.’
“It was wild, it was fun.”
Ayres, who had a kidney transplant 15 years ago and wasn’t sure if he would ever play hockey again, has been a practice goalie with the Leafs and the club’s American Hockey League affiliate, the Toronto Marlies, for the last eight years.
The native of nearby Whitby, Ont., faces shots from professional players on an almost-daily basis during the season, but never thought he’d be called into service in an NHL game.
“These guys were awesome,” said Ayres, the oldest goalie in league history to win his regular-season debut. “They said to me, ‘Have fun with it, don’t worry about how many goals go in, this is your moment, have fun with it.'”
He did more than that, and was greeted with raucous cheers from the Hurricanes in their locker room after finishing a post-game TV interview.
“I had no idea I was going to get a shower before I got in the shower,” Ayres, the game’s first star, said with a grin. “I got one.”
Not long after the final buzzer, the Hurricanes were hawking t-shirts on Twitter sporting the stand-in goalie’s No. 90.
“It’s pretty special,” Hurricanes head coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “I told the guys after the game, ‘Thank him because that just gave (us) an incredible memory.'”
Warren Foegele scored twice, while Martin Necas, with a goal and an assist, Lucas Wallmark, Nino Niederreiter and Sebastian Aho provided the rest of the offence for Carolina (35-22-4).
“He probably dreams of playing in the National Hockey League,” Foegele said of Ayres. “What a moment for him. Something he’ll never forget, and something we won’t either.”
Alexander Kerfoot, Pierre Engvall and John Tavares replied for Toronto (32-23-8), which beat the Hurricanes 8-6 at home in another wild affair at Scotiabank Arena on Dec. 23. Kasperi Kapanen and Tyson Barrie picked up two assists each for the Leafs, while Frederik Andersen made 41 saves on a disastrous night for the home side.
Toronto was playing poorly before Mrazek went down with the score 3-1 for the visitors, and things didn’t get much better even though Tavares and Engvall scored on consecutive attempts to make it 4-3 through 40 minutes.
“The reality is that the game really just stayed the same,” said head coach Sheldon Keefe, whose players mustered just seven shots in the third. “When the goalie switch happened, I talked to the team and said, ‘If we don’t change how we’re playing, they don’t even need a goalie. There’re no chances, no shots, there’s nothing happening.’
“They didn’t need a goaltender the way the game was going.”
Reimer started for the Hurricanes against his former team, but left with a lower-body injury in the first after being bowled over in his crease. He was replaced by Mrazek, who made 31 saves in Friday’s 5-2 home loss to the New York Rangers. But Carolina’s second option went down after that thunderous encounter with Clifford as both players raced for the puck along the sideboards with 8:41 left in the second.
That forced Ayres, who’s been the emergency goalie in Toronto for about half the games this season and is available to either team, into action for the remainder of a matchup between two clubs battling for playoff positioning in the Eastern Conference.
“You kind of think, ‘Oh well how’s this gonna end up?'” Brind’Amour said. “That’s incredible. That’s why you do this.”
After the bizarre second that saw Carolina score four times, give up two goals, lose Mrazek, and have Ayres pressed into action, the Hurricanes made it 5-3 just 53 seconds into the third after jumping on a turnover and beating Andersen in tight.
Necas then made it 6-3 at 3:44 when he picked up a loose puck to finish off a chaotic sequence as boos rained down.
The jeers continued on a Leafs power play later in the period and got louder as the period wore on, with some fans chanting “Let’s Go Raptors!” as the final minutes ticked down on an embarrassing performance from the home side.
“We obviously didn’t handle the circumstances of the game very well,” Leafs captain John Tavares said. “Might have been our poorest night of execution.
“We seemed like the team that played last night and travelled.”
Carolina trailed 1-0 after the first, but tied it at 5:46 of the second when Wallmark scored off a scramble. Niederrieter then blasted a one-timer on a power play at 9:43 before Foegele made it 3-1 at 10:49.
Mrazek was out of the game 30 seconds later.
Aho made it 4-1 with Clifford in the box for charging at 13:17, but Tavares scored on the first shot against Ayres through the five-hole 19 seconds after that.
Engvall buried a loose puck on Toronto’s next shot at 15:10 to make it 4-3.
The Leafs, who were coming of an encouraging 4-0 win over Pittsburgh on Thursday, then got a power play — fans screamed “Shoot!” almost every time a Toronto player had the puck anywhere near the opposition net — but the Hurricanes didn’t allow anything through.
Ayres, who got paid US$500 and his gets to keep his jersey, made his first save late in the second on Auston Matthews as Carolina led 4-3 through a wild 40 minutes and shut things down in the third.
“These guys,” Ayres said of what he’ll remember most. “How great they were to me. The crowd in Toronto was unreal. Even though I was on the other team they were so receptive. Every time I made a save I could hear them cheering for me.
“Awesome.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 22, 2020.
TORONTO – Reigning PWHL MVP and scoring champ Natalie Spooner will miss the start of the regular season for the Toronto Sceptres, general manager Gina Kingsbury announced Tuesday on the first day of training camp.
The 33-year-old Spooner had knee surgery on her left anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) after she was checked into the boards by Minnesota’s Grace Zumwinkle in Game 3 of their best-of-five semifinal series on May 13.
She had a goal and an assist in three playoff games but did not finish the series. Toronto was up 2-1 in the semifinal at that time and eventually fell 3-2 in the series.
Spooner led the PWHL with 27 points in 24 games. Her 20 goals, including five game-winners, were nine more than the closest skater.
Kingsbury said there is no timeline, as the team wants the Toronto native at 100 per cent, but added that “she is doing really well” in her recovery.
The Sceptres open the PWHL season on Nov. 30 when they host the Boston Fleet.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — A top official of the Pakistan Cricket Board declined Friday to confirm media reports that India has decided against playing any games in host Pakistan during next year’s Champions Trophy.
“My view is if there’s any problems, they (India) should tell us in writing,” PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi told reporters in Lahore. “I’ll share that with the media as well as with the government as soon as I get such a letter.”
Indian media reported Friday that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has communicated its concerns to all the Champions Trophy stakeholders, including the PCB, over the Feb. 19-March 9 tournament and would not play in arch-rival Pakistan.
The Times of India said that “Dubai is a strong candidate to host the fixtures involving the Men in Blue” for the 50-over tournament.
Such a solution would see Pakistan having to travel to a neutral venue to play India in a group match, with another potential meeting later in the tournament if both teams advanced from their group. The final is scheduled for March 9 in Pakistan with the specific venue not yet decided.
“Our stance is clear,” Naqvi said. “They need to give us in writing any objections they may have. Until now, no discussion of the hybrid model has happened, nor are we prepared to accept one.”
Political tensions have stopped bilateral cricket between the two nations since 2008 and they have competed in only multi-nation tournaments, including ICC World Cups.
“Cricket should be free of politics,” Naqvi said. “Any sport should not be entangled with politics. Our preparations for the Champions Trophy will continue unabated, and this will be a successful event.”
The PCB has already spent millions of dollars on the upgrade of stadiums in Karachi, Lahore and Rawalpindi which are due to host 15 Champions Trophy games. Naqvi hoped all the three stadiums will be ready over the next two months.
“Almost every country wants the Champions Trophy to be played here (in Pakistan),” Naqvi said. “I don’t think anyone should make this a political matter, and I don’t expect they will. I expect the tournament will be held at the home of the official hosts.”
Eight countries – Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, England, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand and Afghanistan – are due to compete in the tournament, the schedule of which is yet to be announced by the International Cricket Council.
“Normally the ICC announces the schedule of any major tournament 100 days before the event, and I hope they will announce it very soon,” Naqvi said.
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia – Ottawa‘s Gabriela Dabrowski and Erin Routliffe of New Zealand are through to the doubles final at the WTA Finals after a 7-6 (7), 6-1 victory over Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the United States and Australia’s Ellen Perez in semifinal action Friday.
Dabrowski and Routliffe won a hard-fought first set against serve when Routliffe’s quick reaction at the net to defend a Perez shot gave the duo set point, causing Perez to throw down her racket in frustration.
The second seeds then cruised through the second set, winning match point on serve when Melichar-Martinez couldn’t handle Routliffe’s shot.
The showdown was a rematch of last year’s semifinal, which Melichar-Martinez and Perez won in a super tiebreak.
Dabrowski and Routliffe will face the winner of a match between Katerina Siniakova and Taylor Townsend, and Hao-Ching Chan and Veronika Kudermetova in the final on Saturday.
Dabrowski is aiming to become the first Canadian to win a WTA Finals title.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
