A win to finish out the year

After no effort in so many important games, the Sabres showed up to collect a meaningless win over the Boston Bruins. Vanek got a hat-trick, and Thibault got a shutout to give Buffalo a 3-0 victory.

The powerplay finally looked good for Buffalo, with the Sabres scoring on two of their three powerplay chances. Vanek's hat-trick was the fourth of the season (and his career).

Teppo Numminen played his first (and last) game of the season, and finished the year with just over 16 minutes of ice time. Hopefully he is more healthy next year.

Thibault got his second shutout of the year, despite only playing in nine games. Based on his play a few of the times he has been in, I have no idea how this happens.

The Capitals won their game meaning that they secured the last playoff spot for this season. I guess I have to root for Ovechkin to win at least the East.

My Three Stars

Thomas Vanek (three goals)

Derek Roy (two assists)

Jocelyn Thibault (shutout)

Buffalo can't even beat Phoenix

The Buffalo Sabres lost big to the Phoenix Coyotes 6-2 in a rare afternoon game. The offense looked okay at times, but on the defensive side of things the Sabres played very poorly.

Sometimes it's easy just to blame the backup goaltender for the loss, but that would seem to be accurate here. Thibault did not play well at all in net for the Sabres giving up a number of easy goals. Phoenix honestly deserved only one or two of those. Two goals if often still not enough to win most of the time, but the team had to worry about what was very shaky goaltending.

The best players for Buffalo were Stafford, and Gaustad who not only got Buffalo's only two goals of the game, but also were the most aggressive on the team. No body really played bad, but there was a noticeable lack of effort from the Buffalo side in general at times.

Official Three Stars

Shane Doan

Derek Morris

Peter Mueller

My Three Stars

Peter Mueller (two points, plus two)

Shane Doan (two points, plus two)

Ed Jovanovski (one goal, plus one)

Thibault gets the shutout

Jocelyn Thibault got himself a shutout against Montreal in his third start of the season. He stopped all 24 shots he faced to bring the Sabres to a 3-0 victory.

Spacek got the first goal of the game on the powerplay, hitting the net on a bad angle despite never being able to do so from out on the point. The Sabres later goal by Vanek also was the result of converting on a rebound. Spacek was actually on the ice for all three goals scored, and played well on defense as well.

Buffalo's penalty killers did an excellent job in the game, killing all three of their penalties. Montreal has had one of the better powerplay teams but the Sabres have now outplayed them in these situations for two straight games.

The Sabres have been playing well of late and are have just won four straight, and are coming up against an easy opponent in Washington.

Official Three Stars

Jocelyn Thibault

Thomas Vanek

Brian Campbell

My Three Stars

Jocelyn Thibault (the shutout)

Jaroslav Spacek (played well both ways)

Thomas Vanek (played real well two straight nights)

Buffalo hands Panthers a win on a Platter

Theoretically the Sabres are a much better team then the Panthers. Buffalo really should have won this game, but that would require them to actually show up. The Sabres had a few stretches in which they massively outplayed Florida, but they were unable to score on these opportunities, and followed them with catastrophic Defensive breakdowns.

Thibault actually played rather well, but just got no help on the night. A bit more of a back check was really needed in this game, as too often Buffalo's defensive was just outnumbered deep in their zone, for no apparent reason. On the few offensive opportunities the Sabres put far too many pucks wide of the net.

Pratt looked ok in his first game with Buffalo, but was by and large just average in his play. He was in for Spacek who presumably re-aggravated his prior injury in the game last night.

The line of Vanek and Afinogenov was on the ice for were both on the ice for three goals against, and their linemate Roy has been putting up some very poor defensive numbers all season long. You need to play both ways. After leading the league in plus minus last season Vanek is at -4 so far this year.

Official Three Stars

Richard Zednik

Jozef Stumpel

Stephen Weiss

My Three Stars

Richard Zednik (two goals)

Jozef Stumpel (assisted on both the Zednik goals)

Radek Dvorak (got the games first goal)

Buffalo Comes back to beat the Leafs

The Sabres brought back memories of last season as they relied upon a dramatic comeback, followed by a dominating overtime performance to win the game.

At first the game started looking like the one against the Capitals in that the Sabres looked as if they were going to be shut out to lose a close one. Toronto was able to go into the third period with a 2-0 lead. However, also like the Capitals game Buffalo was able to come back with a flood of late goals in order to win the game.

The Sabres finally got on the board with only 12 minutes left in the game, as Adam Mair scored off a pass from Roy. Mair who had even less goals then Spacek last season already has two this year and is actually tied with scoring machine Thomas Vanek so far. Vanek himself got a goal tonight as did Pominville and Hecht.

Ales Kotalik who is by far the teams best shoot out player prevented the shootout in this game by scoring unassisted with only four seconds left in overtime.

This was Thibault's first start of the season, and he was good enough for the win. Spacek left the game late in the third with an unspecified injury, no details on that yet. The Sabres get a few rest days before they have to play Columbus on Friday night.

Official Three Stars

Ales Kotalik

Tim Connolly

Chad Kilger

My Three Stars

Ales Kotalik - (came up big in OT)

Jason Pominville - (a goal and an assist)

John Pohl - (three assists for Toronto)

Sabres win high scoreing preseason affair

A high scoring game with both the teams starting back up goalies, but still a fun close game.

Vanek, Stafford, and Pominville all played well as they usually do, but the Sabres also benefited from offensive plays from their defencemen as both Campbell and Tallinder picked up points in the game. Roy had an awesome game again. Some may think that it's too early to say this, but Roy is the new Drury. No questions asked. Roy had two goals and two assists, including the game winner in the final minute.

Buffalo rookie Zagrapan picked up a late game tieing goal that proved crucial to setting up the Sabres to win this one.

Thibault actually played well despite the high score as most of the Penguins goals came on the powerplay, and he even stopped a penalty shot by Malkin early in the first period. This of course continues on Buffalo's poor special teams play during this preseason. The Sabres allowed three goals on six penalty kill opportunities, while they failed to score on all of their chances, although Campbell's goal came just as a penalty expired.

Tonights captain was Derek Roy, with Pominville and Mair as the alternates. Lindy Ruff is running out of time to decide. The Sabres and the Penguins have a preseason rematch Saturday night back up in Buffalo.