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Too much to overcome, including egregious non-calls |
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The first thing to take into consideration, other than the thin, mile-high air in Colorado, is that the Buffalo Sabres were coming off of their bye week which hasn't good for most teams this season. The silly NHL Players Association came up with this cockamamie idea that it's players needed a bye week, because, well, the NHL got something so the NHLPA wanted something in return. I guess we could say that one backfired as teams coming out of the bye week were a combined 4-12-4 as of yesterday, which equates to an unmitigated disaster. And last night you could add another one to the loss column as the Sabres were downed by the Colorado Avalanche last night, 5-3.
A couple of the biggest problems that players seem to have coming out of a five-day hiatus from all things hockey seems to be the feel of the puck on the stick and timing, both of which were problem areas for the Sabres early last night as they fell into a 3-0 hole less than 15 minutes into the opening period.
Yet, even so, the Sabres had opportunities against the league's worst team with the score close but a brilliant save here, a lucky one there and a near miss or two kept Buffalo off the scoreboard. They did, however, manage a powerplay goal with just under two minutes to play in the first period to cut make it 3-1 and the Sabres continued to mount a sustained effort in the second period. Despite some stellar goaltending by Colorado's Jeremy Smith, the Sabres pulled to within one midway through the second before the teams traded goals and went into the third period with the Sabres down 4-3.
Buffalo head coach Dan Bylsma finally has himself four lines to work with this season. Granted, they have a $10 million fourth line but, so be it. The return of Sam Reinhart (who scored a goal last night) and Zemgus Girgensons (who had a primary assist) plus the fine play of call-up Evan Rodrigues, who scored his first goal of the season, allowed the entire forward group to fall into place.
The defense, however, is a different story as that group has glaring needs. Outside of the top-pairing of Rasmus Ristolainen and Jake McCabe, each defenseman in the bottom-four have glaring weaknesses which were exposed last night.
With all that going against them, Buffalo still had the momentum and when they went on the powerplay with 7:22 to go, opportunity knocked. Gabriel Landeskog went off for holding and a Buffalo powerplay that was already 1/3 hit the ice. About a minute into the powerplay Buffalo's Jack Eichel was hauled down in the Colorado zone with the puck no where near him, a sure penalty for a two-man advantage. Right? No call from either referee Brad Watson or Dean Morton, however and instead of the Sabres having a 5-on-3, a fuming Bylsma had to watch as his powerplay was extinguished.
Even after that egregious non-call, the Sabres continued to press and pulled the goalie for the extra attacker with just over 2 minutes to go. A minute later egregious non-call No. 2 happened as Eichel was full stick-between-the-legs tripped right in front of Watson with no call.
So it goes, and so it went
The Sabres are in Arizona tonight to take on the Coyotes. Missing out on two points last night, or even one, hurt in the standings as they're seven points behind the Toronto Maple Leafs in the division and six points behind the Boston Bruins for the second wild card spot in the conference.
In looking at the standings the NHL's gotta be loving the Atlantic Division as it has an all-Canadian trio up top with Montreal in first, Ottawa in second and Toronto in third. Plus it has two Canadian teams presently in the playoffs out west in Edmonton and Calgary. Not bad considering that all seven Canadian teams missed the playoffs last season with Toronto and Edmonton finishing 30th and 29th respectfully.
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