Buffalo throws away home advantage in 4-2 Game 2 defeat
Boxscore
Score: Buffalo Sabres 2-4 Boston Bruins
Shots: BUF 36-26 BOS
Buffalo Sabres Goals: Byram 1 (Malenstyn, Power); Krebs (Dahlin, Tuch)
Boston Bruins Goals: Arvidsson 1 (Aspirot, Mittelstadt); Geekie 2 (Pastrnak, Kuraly); Zacha 1 PPG (Pastrnak, McAvoy); Arvidsson 2 (Aspirot, Mittelstadt)
Quick Thoughts
Bring On The Chaos
The question of who will beat the puck drop drum every game and lead the “Let’s Go Buffalo” chant has led to a number of interesting names come up. Rick Jeanneret’s wife was certainly the right choice for Game 1, and interestingly the Sabres went with Buffalo Bill Josh Allen.
Unfortunately, that was the highest point of the evening for the Sabres. Buffalo had a decent start and got some shots on goal playing aggressively, but the alarm bells sounded early as the Bruins seemed to consistently be getting behind the Sabres backline. It took a couple of excellent saves on the breakaway from Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen to keep Buffalo from going into the hole early on.
The extra-curriculars were always going to be a big part of the game especially after the Sabres had outhit the Bruins in the first game, and it started early. Dahlin and Lindholm went at it after a minute, and the parade line to the penalty box never really stopped for the rest of the evening.
What also didn’t stop was the Sabres power play goal drought, with two more attempts going in vain as the period ended 0-0, but the Bruins had the edge in scoring chances 13-6. But the warning signs were there for all to see, because Boston looked like they had made the necessary changes to counteract the Sabres’ speed.
Second Period Disaster
This was a strange period in so many ways. First Buffalo was finally made to pay for repeatedly letting a forward behind the last man, with Arvidsson shaking free of Samuelsson and the Bruin sweeping his backhand five-hole as UPL was clearly looking for him to cut across onto his forehand like he had done in the first period on a short-handed breakaway.
Down one, no problem. Unfortunately, the Bruins continued to have crisper passes and controlled the play but another wasted Sabres power play just made things more tense. And then it all fell apart. Geekie had a hopeful scoop down the ice take a lucky bounce that completely outfoxed UPL to his great embarrassment, and it was 2-0.
Thompson picked a really bad time to take a bad penalty, and the Bruins made the Sabres pay, getting their second power play goal of the series to make it 3-0 off a nifty deflection from Zacha that left UPL with no chance.
Buffalo ended the period down three, outshot 18-16 and behind in that total for the first time in the series, despite having more scoring chances 12-10.
What The Heck
Buffalo scored four goals in the third period two nights ago, they would need to do that again tonight to come back from the dead. Instead, sixteen seconds into the game they let Arvidsson get free on a two-on-one and as Dahlin defended the pass, the forward got his second of the game going over UPL’s shoulder and in off the iron, 4-0. UPL got yanked by Ruff ending a strange night for the Finn, with Lyon going in for the first time since returning from his injury.
The next six minutes were a penalty box management nightmare as first McAvoy had a dirty clip on Malenstyn that immediately had him in the middle of a melee. Then Zadorov took down Benson setting off another furor, that had players fighting into the TV timeout and 10-minute misconducts for Thompson, Benson, Zadorov and Peeke and a total of 68 penalty minutes adjudicated between the two incidents.
Midway through the period, the Sabres were being outshot 8-5 in a game they were four goals behind. The building was quiet and everyone was basically just waiting to end this nightmare of a game and move on to Boston.
The Sabres killed off a Krebs penalty and then were futile on the man advantage yet again before they finally decided to start playing hockey again. They had managed five shots on the power play, and then at even strength finally broke down Swayman with Byram wiring a wrister over the goalie’s shoulder to make it 4-1.
Kudos to the Sabres for not settling for that scoreline, as they pulled the goalie and went for it. 74 seconds later they had a second as Dahlin’s slapper from the blue line clanked off the iron and came out through Swayman’s legs where Krebs was waiting to tuck it home five-hole. 4-2 and Boston was in disarray and the KBC library was bouncing again. Bruins head coach Sturm had famously refused to call a timeout on Sunday as the Sabres stormed back to win, and he needed Swayman to wildly gesticulate for a break before calling one tonight.
The Bruins had a couple of chances at the empty net but as the Sabres poured on the shots, the Bruins held firm and there was to be no further scoring. Buffalo ended the period 20-8 on shots, and 22-6 on chances, but the careless mistakes from earlier in the game had done the damage.
At The Horn
The Buffalo Sabres have blown their home advantage splitting the first two game in Buffalo 1-1 as the series now moves to Boston. Ruff will be encouraged by how the team ended the game because at 4-0 and after all the fights on the ice, it was looking like they had given up.
This was always going to be a very physical series and tonight Boston outhit Buffalo 32-30 but despite being outshot 36-26 came away with the 4-2 win and played exactly the kind of game that the Sabres have often done on the road this season.
The Arvidsson – Mittelstadt – Aspirot line had gotten victimized in Game 1 but came back to make the telling contributions tonight. The Sabres will need a similar effort from the Benson – Norris – Doan line in the next couple of games as they were on the receiving end of a lot of the damage tonight. For as good as they were in Game 1, Dahlin and Samuelsson had a forgettable night tonight and will need to bounce back in a hurry. Zucker and McLeod are also yet to register a point and will need to start contributing.