The Buffalo Sabres wagon just keeps on rolling, with the Sabres winning all four games last week, and all came in different ways ending with that ultimate barnburning Game of the Season last night.
This week’s edition of the Player of the Week is a bit of a cop-out, but hear me out.
Player of the Week
The entire Buffalo Sabres organization
The Sabres are playing like no one else right now. They have the best record in the league from December on. Different players are stepping it up each game and doing whatever needs doing, and Buffalo keeps winning. They sit atop the Atlantic Division for the first time this late in the season since April 2010.
The unity and team spirit on the roster is incredible. When adversity (or an opponent) strikes, teammates have been stepping up for and defending each other. The players combined to score 49 points in the last four games. They scored five times on the power play and had two shorthanded goals too. They scrapped and fought when they needed to. The goaltenders made the timely saves that they have been making.
The General Manager saw two areas he could improve on the team – talent and toughness. The asking price for the first was steep and would involve messing with team chemistry. The second would cost picks and prospects and that is what Jarmo Kekäläinen ended up doing.
And then there’s the weary, failure-worn fans who have endured times like few other fanbases have in the history of the game. So many of us have been here from the early days of the franchise, have lived through the almost-years of ‘No Goal’ and then ‘Staph infection’, endured the lean drought years and are still here. Our sense of humor is bitter at times and can be twisted, but it comes from conditioning.
No matter what happens in the rest of the season, and postseason, this campaign has been quite the ride. The player of the week award for this week goes to every single person associated with the Buffalo Sabres franchise. This moment belongs to us.