You win some you lose some

by David Oleksy on Apr 1, 2008 11:14 AM EDT

With the Buffalo Sabres likely to miss the playoffs and by only a couple of points, it seems that everyone is looking at the points they have given up in the past couple of weeks and throughout the season. There is no denying that they would love to replay the third period of the Senators game and the final five minutes of the Habs game. It seems that even Lindy Ruff is looking back at some of those losses.

"Well, I don't want to stand here and be where we're at," Ruff said Monday, a day before the Sabres play at Toronto to open a season-ending three-game road trip. "I just feel that we could've been a little bit better in a few of those situations that we let slip away."

I don't want to discount what Lindy is saying because he is absolutely right about what happened recently and it's inexcusable but it hasn't always bad news. I can remember a couple of games just off the top of my head where Buffalo came back and stole two points. A game played back in October against the Leafs with Jochen Hecht tying the game in the final five minutes. I remember erasing a 2-1 third period deficit against the Flyers back in December, a couple of days later Thomas Vanek tipping a Jochen Hecht shot by Marty Biron in the final 10 seconds to tie the game. Of course who could forget the recent game against the Tampa Bay Lightning when Buffalo scored six third period goals and that wasn't the first time they came back against the Lightning.

The Buffalo Sabres can easily look at a few games during the season as the points they lost on their way to missing the playoffs but it is much more realistic to say that they aren't good enough to be there. I have talked over and over again about the talent on this team and it is still there but they need to harness it and become a winning team. I can not sit here and talk about the lost points when I know that this team is exactly what I thought they would be. I'm sure that at least once before the season I mentioned this team being a 7-10 seed in the Eastern Conference and that is exactly what they are.

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Comments

It's not a question of talent

I believe it is more of a consistancy problem...not just offensively either the defense has had holes in it all season and Miller has been really spotty this season...Overall I like this team and how it is composed but the cosistancy issue raises big questions, I think that Pommers and Roy have figured it out as they are two of the highest scorers since the allstar break (just under malkin and ovechkin) but players like stafford and afingenov are really streaky and need to gain some consistancy...I am a huge Max fan I have his autographed jersey hangin on my wall, I love his wreckless style of play but unfortunatly that doesn't always produce results, I think if we get just a few more plays to start playing consistant hockey night in and night out this team will go far...on another note as much of a fan of Connolly as I am he is just too injury prone, he is a great player but the last time he played more than 65 games was back in the 2002 season and as good as he is on the powerplay I think he needs to get over his injury bug and start playing

by Lion Alum on Apr 1, 2008 11:51 AM EDT reply actions

Consistency

It is definitely a consistency issue with this team. They not only look like a different team from game-to-game but from period-to-period hell even from shift-to-shift. I think that being one of the youngest teams in the league and having as much talent as they have they will be fine in the future. As for Connolly and Max I am a big fan of both but it may be time to go in a different direction with those guys. In looking at next years roster I believe they have too many NHL players and will try to make a couple of off-season moves.

D.O. www.diebytheblade.com

by David Oleksy on Apr 1, 2008 12:17 PM EDT up reply actions