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Thomas Vanek appreciated your loud ovation for him during the video board tribute in the first period.
He feels for his former Sabres teammates and what they are going through this season.
Thanks. Habs TV
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Head coach Ted Nolan didn't have a definitive update regarding Enroth's lower body injury in the post game presser. Enroth will be re-evaluated in the morning. It may be a while until Enroth is better.
In the meantime, Michal Neuvirth will try to skate on Monday morning. If he can skate, he'll play on the four game roadie. If he can't, then the Sabres will have to call up Matt Hackett from Rochester.
Best case: Neuvirth backed up by Lieuwen.
Worst case: Lieuwen backed up by Hackett.
Now its time to stab westward to Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, Montreal, and Smashville.
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Its Nathan Lieuwen's lucky night in Buffalo.
The 23 year old was called up to Buffalo for the Montreal game when it was learned that Michal Neuvirth is dealing with an injury (day-to-day).
Lieuwen has been playing well in Rochester this season and was the logical choice to be promoted to play back up Jhonas Enroth.
Lieuwen's number was called late in the second period when Sabres D Jamie McBain inexplicably upended Habs forward Brendan Gallagher in the slot, the drove his skates into Enroth's blocker and mid section. Enroth was forced to leave the game. Gallagher made no attempt to avoid Enroth and thus the heavy collision ensued.
One man's loss is another man's gain.
Lieuwen, and Abbottsford, BC native, just may find himself stabbing westward with the Sabres to Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, and Montreal this week. If Neuvirth and Enroth are both on the shelf for a period of time, Lieuwen may well be your new starter.
More to come on Enroth's injury after the game....
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Goal scoring has become a lost art form in post apocalypse Buffalo.
The salad days have come and gone. The gold rush has ended, for now. Goal scoring was never a problem for the old Sabres of the early to mid-2000's. It was a badge of honor, and a strength.
Nobody did it better than Thomas Vanek in Buffalo. When the Sabres needed a game tying goal or a game winner, they relied on Vanek. When they needed a shootout hero, Vanek took center stage and delivered with great frequency.
The Austrian sniper has scored 271 goals in his illustrious NHL career, with 254 of them coming while he adorned a Sabres sweater the past nine seasons.
The Sabres tipped their bucket to Vanek on his first trip back to Buffalo in an opposing sweater. The team shared this well produced tribute video on the in-house HB board during a first period TV timeout. The crowd cheered Vanek and his former teammates gave him a stick tap in unison.
Classy.
Thanks, Sabres.com
On Sunday afternoon, Vanek met with media in the visitors room at FNC.
He admitted that butterflies were fluttering in his belly.
"I don’t know what to expect really. All I know is I have a lot of good memories in this building, in this town. It’s something I’ll cherish forever."
Vanek was a key cog in the machine and was counted upon to be a leaders after Drury and Briere were sent packing from Buffalo. Vanek, Miller, Roy, Pominville, and Gaustad represented the core group that Lindy Ruff and Darcy Regier tried unsuccessfully to win with.
"Looking back at it and even talking to some of the guys who are not here anymore, it’s unfortunate," Vanek said. "I thought we were a good team, a solid core. We always talked about not getting to the next level, but I thought if you really look back at what happened is that Danny and Chris left at the time, and they told us to step up, which is great. We all wanted that to happen, but we never replaced two good players.
"In this league you need depth, and I think five, six players can only take you so far. The way I look at it, I wish we would have went and got two, three, four more good guys. We really could have made some runs."
Shoulda. Coulda. Woulda.
Vanek will test free agency in July. He's destined to sign a multi-year deal, north of $50 million with the Minnesota Wild.
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So I stopped off for a cup of joe with the boys earlier this morning after we skated hard 90 minutes.
I like going around the table to solid, candid insight from guys whose opinions that I respect.
The conversation segued from the Sabres' lackluster performance on Long Island into a passionate debate about who the Sabres should pick in the first round in the NHL entry draft in June.
Around the horn we went. Five of the seven guys made a solid case for why Tim Murray should use his soon-to-be top three pick on Sam Reinhart. He's a center. Buffalo are thin down the middle right now. He's skilled and shows a lot of promise.
When my turn came, I opted for the known commodity. The NHL prototype D-man in Aaron Ekblad. Out came my Sharpie. I proceeded to handicap my first ten picks for the boys. We're getting to the point where Murray, Kevin Devine and their scouts have to step up their collective game to identify the areas of most critical need on the Sabres right now. Having watched McBain, Ehrhoff, Tallinder, Sulzer, and the Sabres D corps get danced and juked for countless bushel baskets full of pucks this season, I'm all about reinforcing the blue line with steel girders. I'm sick of the sway and the bent-but-don't-break, composite structure of the Buffalo blue line. See veteran Ehrhoff getting torched by Lynyrd Skynyd--repeatedly-- in Raleigh earlier this week. As a collective unit, the Buffalo D have been very kind to enemy forwards this season. I've seen enough of it. Its time to shift the paradigm to big, rugged D, who have fast hands and fast feet. Ryan Miller was a human eraser for the Sabres for the majority of this dismal regular season. He doesn't live in Buffalo anymore. Miller was like an industrial size drum full of "Goof Off". He would eliminate a dozen of so scuffs, blemishes, and sloppy mistakes from each game. Its time for Murray to retrofit the Buffalo end of the rink with
mobile, hostile, fast moving projectiles.
That's why all day long I make Aaron Ekblad my first pick in this draft.
Call me conservative. Call me dumb. Call me what you want. I could care less.
I for one am stick and bloody of Sabres opponents who have been feasting on soft, passive D-zone coverage for the past few couple of seasons. Lets face it, the Buffalo blue line has been been wide open for interstate and international traffic for two seasons. Its like there's an EZ-Pass or Nexus sign hanging over the blue line.'
It has to stop. Now.
Ekblad is a no nonsense kind of guy. He's an honest D with exceptionally fast hands and equally as potent feet. He plays the game honestly and with high integrity. He doesn't fight every game, but when he does, it inspires his teammates to get their heads out of the derrieres and to get to work. In my opinion, he's the exact high character player that the Sabres should be investing in. Imagine a time in the not too distant future where Ekblad joins a Buffalo D corps that already boasts of premium D-men Ristolainen, Zadorov, Myers, and McCabe. THAT's what I'm talkin' about. No free lunches. No free government cheese. You want to skate through the Buffalo end of the rink with your head down and a puck on your twig. Fine. Get the smelling salts ready for your fifteen minute field trip to the "quiet room".
Oh, by the by. Ekblad has a lethal weapon of a clapper.
So here's how I see the top ten picks in the June entry draft.
1- Ekblad D 6’4 216 Barrie OHL
2- Reinhart C 6’1 185 Kootenay WHL
3- Bennett LW 6’1 178 Kingston OHL
4- Dal Colle C 6’2 182 Oshawa OHL
5- Draisaitl C 6’2 204 Prince Albert WHL
6- Perlini LW 6’3 205 Niagara OHL
7- Ritchie LW 6’3 225 Peterborough
8- Nylander C 5’11 169 Modo Sweden
9 -Virtanen LW 6’1 208 Calgary WHL
10- Tuch RW R 6’4 213 USA Under-18 NTDP
So where do I get a future #1 center if I'm selecting Ekblad above all else? Its easy. I use the first rounder from the Islanders to get me close to Bennett or Draisaitl. How do I know that Garth Snow ill be giving up his 2014 first rounder instead of his 2015 first rounder? I don't, however, Snow has said on the record several times in the past two weeks that he thinks that the 2014 entry draft is thinner than the McDavid-Eichel draft of 2015. He'd be wise to call Tim Murray in early June and fork over the 2014 first rounder from the Vanek-Moulson trade. It will be another top five draft pick with which Murray then can target Bennett or Draisaitl.
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I'd love it if Murray could find a way to draft Nick Ritchie, the Peterborough bad ass. Ritchie is big, strong, mean, fearless, and has a lot of skill. He's a Hell's Angel on ice. That's why I slot he and Perlini in my top 8.
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