The Sabres built a 3-0 lead against the Flyers. Gave up four straight goals. Then they tied it with the goalie pulled. Then they lost in OT when Marc-Andre Gragnani decided that Claude Giroux (now the NHL leader in points and a guy who already had 3 points last night) needed to be gift wrapped a breakaway.
Ummm, yeah......
Did I mention that Nathan Gerbe was boarded and suffered another UBI and that Ville Leino could be suspended?
But before I get to the negatives from last night, let's get to some positives.
Positive #1 Zack Kassian - Kassian had a beautiful assist on a tic-tac-toe passing play from Luke Adam to BZK to Ville Leino for the tap in. Adam started the play by getting a nice turnover as the Flyers were trying to transition out of their zone on the PK. Kassian had a sweet one touch backhand pass to Leino. Then Kassian picked up the puck in the neutral zone, carried the puck into the Flyers zone, used the defenseman as a screen, and beat Bryzgalov with a sneaky wrister. As long as Kassian keeps playing like this, he's going to make it impossible to send him back to the Amerks. I already want a Kassian jersey, too.
Positive #2 Leino-Adam-Kassian - The Vanek-[Fill in the blank]-Pominville line has been doing the heavy lifting offensively all season. But, this line has shown some quick chemistry and is giving the Sabres the secondary scoring that they need badly. Leino is starting to produce like a $4+ million per year guy and Luke Adam is showing that his strong rookie season isn't just a factor of playing with Vanek and Pominville.
Positive #3 The early and late offense - Jumping out to the 3-0 lead late in the first and getting the OT forcing goal with Miller on the bench were both great.
Now to the negatives.......
Negative #1 Gerbe gets run and Leino gets stupid - Just what the Sabres didn't need. Gerbe gets hurt on a play that may get Marc-Andre Bourdon Shana-banned and then Ville Leino with the stupid elbow that might get himself Shana-banned. Just when Leino was starting to get into my good graces with increased offensive production and he does this. Come on man!
Negative #2 Turnovers - Honestly, I don't know whether the Gragnani turnover in OT or the Gerbe turnover in the last 10 seconds of the first period was worse. In both cases, the Sabres need to make better plays with the puck.
Negative #3 Miller's head - I don't care about Miller's negative body language after giving up tipped and screened goals. I don't know that it bothers his teammates because I'm not in their heads. But, I do believe that Miller's body language and his reaction to less than ideal goals is an area that he could improve upon. And on Miller's mask coming off, how about mask maker's putting chin straps back on goalie masks and goalies actually using them.....
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