Watch Out!!! The Fearless Sabres Will Go Far & Deep Into Playoffs!!!

The Sabres, with the Devils are the two teams in the Eastern Conference to peak at the right time for the playoffs. The Sabres won back to back shut outs with a convincing 4-0 win against the Hurricanes tonight. The Sabres will play the Flyers for the first round starting this Saturady and should be able to defeat the Flyers and go into the next round. The way things go, it may very well be the Sabres against the Devils in the Conference Final. The Devils are a formidable team as of now but the good doc will take the fearless Sabres to win the Conference title if they hit all the cylinders in full stride. If so, the Sabres can beat any team in the Western Conference and shall take the Stanley Cup home this time around.

There is something the good doc marvels about the Sabres, essentially a low budget, no name team, who was not given much chance to succeed this season. The Sabres exemplify a Cinderella story.

Give credit where credit is deserved, they are a gritty, spirited, speedy, and energetic team. They usually displayed great team work, which by far is more important than the individual talents of each player. Also, it seems every one of their players can score goals. The Flyers are in general bigger and slower team. Even with Forsberg in the Philly line up is not enough to compensate a faster Sabres team with a lot of scoring touch. I will be more concerned if and when the Sabres meet the Devils since New Jersey knows how to play to win. With regard to the goalie issues, although the Sabres have two hot goalies, it is reasonable to assume that they will ride Miller all the way, unless if he bungles badly or is injured.

Kathleen said:

Its true, but Philly does do well none the less. Its almost like wearing down the other team.
The TB who won the cup reminds me a little of Buffalo, but deeper in talent. TB did move on as we know, but it took a ton out of them.

This will be a dandy series, and will be curious which of us will be correct.

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Speed, better team work and scoring touch of the Sabres will wear down the bigger and slower Flyers. Sabres should win this series. Either way, you can come and wear down the good doc.

The First Game Is A Dandy!!!

Wow, what a game between the young Sabres and the big, bad Phillies! The two teams played each other tough. Give Robert Esche a lot of credit for keeping the Flyers in the game when the Sabres peppered him with twice as many shots as Phillies put on Ryan Miller. The speedy Sabres clearly dominated the Flyers the majority of the time but could not solve Esche until the second OT. The rest of the series should be very interesting. A lot of OTs would play in the young speedy Sabres' favor.

ottawasub said:

Hitchcock has to be careful. The Flyers were picked by many to win the Cup before the season started. If they lose in the 1st round, somebody`s going to get fired; and we all know it won`t be Bobby Clarke.

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There is no love lost between the Sabres and Hitchcock if one goes back in history when his Dallas Stars robbed the Sabres the chance of winning the Stanley Cup via Bret Hull's illegal goal in triple overtime in game six of the 1999 Stanley Cup final. The "No Goal" incidence will forever live in infamy in hockey history. Shame on NHL officiating for not making the right call then. Getting Hitchcock fired is a good additional motivation for the Sabres to dispose of the Flyers in the first round.

Going back to game one of the series, from the entertainment standpoint, game one of the Sabres-Flyers match up was certainly worth its ticket price. While the Sabres were busy swamping the Flyers’ net, the Phillies were like methodical hit men stalking Miller, ready to make a killing whenever they could. The other aspect of the game was like David vs Goliath, with the smallish, mobile, speedy busy bees buzzing around the big, non-agile, and slower monsters. The game has a little bit of everything, including a classic thunderous, clean hit on a bigger man (Umberger) from an unlikely source, a smallish defenseman (Campbell) not known for delivering big, punishing blows. (Please don’t tell Mr. Darcy Tucker of the Leafs that is the legitimate way to clean out someone. He may actually go out and murder someone with this blue print!!! Btw, please do not construe this as a cheap shot on him from the good doc. I just don’t want to turn Darcy into a murderer, that’s all.) My point is, the smallish Sabres were not shy about physical confrontation with the big, rough Flyers.

Playoff inexperience almost costs the Sabres a game. They clearly dominated the more physically imposing but slower bullies called the Flyers. But they lacked the killer instincts to finish them off early in the game and allowed them to almost steal the show. The Sabres need to do a better job in neutralizing the Forsberg-Gagne-Knuble line. They need to solve Robert Esche early in the game to demoralize the Flyers. Phillies will desperately try to win the next game to even the series. If the young Sabres can win the next game at home and carry the momentum to Philadelphia, there is hope that they can finish off the Flyers early and get some well deserve rest for the next round.

Hmmmm…the good doc is wondering if the Sabres were reading what I said. Looks like the Sabres were following the good doc’s blue print and exercised their killer instincts quick and early in the game. They got into Esche’s skin quick and early today. The result was 5-0 at the end of the first period. The Forsberg-Gagne-Knuble line was largely rendered ineffective. The big bad Flyers were demoralized even before the end of the first intermission. Esche was chased from net and was replaced by Antero Niittymaki to begin the second period. Great speed, superb skating ability, fast puck movement, and nice scoring touch will make the Sabres a very dangerous team in the Stanley Cup playoffs.

The Flyers seemed to concede the game was lost early in the second period and their true color came through. Gauthier’s run on Vanek, which drew a 5 minute penalty and game misconduct; Eager’s hit on Campbell which drew a 10 minutes game misconduct, just showed they are the no class, big bad Broad Street bullies who deserved to lose the series.

Something interesting happened before the third period began, the referee went over to the Flyers’ bench and seemed to warn Hitchcock to play hockey, not to play bully. The situation seemed to calm down then until the dying moments at the third period. I guess NHL is making good its words that it will call all infractions the referees see. It is a night that the Sabres make playoff history with two hat tricks by Dumont and Pominville with a score of 8 to 2. The classless Flyers are badly outplayed and thoroughly embarassed themselves. If Ken Hitchcock, the master hockey strategist of the Phillies, cannot figure out something quick to counter the speedy, well balanced Sabres, the Flyers will exit the series quick and early and so as his job as head coach.

Hitch, Get A Grip Of Yourself, Better Play Hockey Instead Of Hookey

The good doc just saw this 4/25/2006 update:
http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/playoffs2006/news/story?id=2420562

This just confirms what I said in the earlier post that there is no love lost between the Sabres, led by head coach Lindy Ruff and the Ken Hitchcock led Flyers. This is partly due to historical precedent as in the 1999 Stanley Cup final between Ruff and Hitchcock. In part, Ruff must be angry that Hitchcock did not control the Flyers and allowed them to become goons in game 2 of this series. The outcome of game 2 is, Hitchcock has the short end of the stick and the Flyers become the butt of jokes in this year’s playoffs so far.

Now that the coaches are letting their feelings known to the world, game 3 in Philadelphia shall be very interesting. The Sabres will try to stay focus and play to win no matter what. As for the Flyers, if they want to win by playing hockey, they better find a good containment strategy that will work. They better play disciplined hockey as that is the best way to contain the speedy Sabres. If so, the Flyers may be able to prolong their playoff life to game 6. On the other hand, if the Flyers go with their fists and elbows, they will lose the game via distraction and penalties. The Sabres will make them pay with power play goals. They are smart enough not to be drawn into major brawls with these bullies. Look for the Sabres to execute their killer instincts quick and early again, with lightening fast, shock and awe scoring on the slow moving Flyers. If so, Sabres can sweep the Flyers in four games.