Goals
1st Period
– Vanek (11) from Hodgson and Leopold
– Tavares (6) from Strait and Boyes
2nd Period
– Ehrhoff (1) from Hodgson and Vanek
– McDonald (1) from Cizikas and Strait
3rd Period
– Sulzer (3) from Ott and Grigorenko
First Period
– Thomas Vanek: is there anything left to say? Thomas Vanek is hockey’s version of The One Ring of Power, forged in the fires of Mount Doom to rule all the free peoples of the NHL. Apparently, Mount Doom is located in Austria. He scores again and would later add an assist.
– The ‘Hoff fell over trying to tie up John Tavares which led directly to Buffalo’s first goal. The defensive struggles continue.
– The least-experienced players for the Sabres are struggling. Mikhail Grigorenko played less than two minutes in the first, while TJ Brennan had some bad offensive giveaways to go along with mostly solid defensive play.
– Buffalo continued to struggle getting the puck out of their own zone, and it showed with the Sabres getting outshot 15-4 in the period.
Second Period
– It took the Sabres eight minutes to get their first shot on net in another horrendous start to a second period. This has been happening way too often.
– However, all is forgiven thanks to a top shelf wrister from Christian Ehrhoff after a beautiful give and go with Cody Hodgson. Secondary scoring!
– More poor defensive coverage and another lost battle along the boards leads to the Islanders tying the game late in the second.
– The Sabres were slightly better with shots in the second, but that’s not saying much. They were outshot 14-7 in the period, 29-11 for the game.
Third Period
– The Sabres went another 7+ minutes without a shot. They were getting outplayed, only staying in it thanks to Miller making some nice saves. But then…
– Alex Suzler blasts one past Nabokov, and the Sabres score their their 3rd goal on just 12 shots.
– John Tavares was awarded a penalty shot after a hook by Christian Ehrhoff, but was no match for Ryan Miller (and the post). Miller was huge in this game, stopping 41 of 43 shots, many of them WOW saves.
– A penalty to Brad Boyes seals the deal, and the Sabres were outshot 43-15. And they won the game. Yowza.
Comment of the Game
Boyes contract finally starts to pay off..
-SabresNYC