Archives for April 7, 2012

‘”Don’t ever like losing. Don’t ever like making the mistakes you made. The chance to make a difference and you didn’t make a difference. You get an opportunity. You’re paid to either score goals or prevent them if you’re a defender. We had two-on-ones we didn’t score. We had a two-on-one we went offside. That’s unacceptable. It’s game-on time. It’s difference time. We’ve talked about this for a good period of time. We’ve had guys push through and make a difference. In the biggest game, we weren’t able to push through.”‘

‘Rookie defensemen T.J. Brennan and Brayden McNabb are also expected to rejoin the Amerks, but the Sabres need them to fill out their blue line today in the season finale against Boston.’

‘This year marks the sixth season in the past 10 the Sabres failed to make the playoffs, all of which — of course — under GM Darcy Regier and head coach Lindy Ruff. Ruff had a lot to do with his team’s failure midway through the season. Regier failed to react quick enough, the same way his team failed to react when its star netminder was steamrolled in November, cost them dearly.’

‘”Don’t ever like making the mistakes you made,” he said in regards to the Sabres’ 2-1 loss in Philadelphia Thursday. “The chance to make a difference, and you didn’t make the difference. You get an opportunity to get paid to score goals, and prevent them if you’re a defender. We had two-on-ones that we didn’t score. We had a two-on-one where we went offside. That’s unacceptable. It’s game on time; it’s difference time. We’ve talked about this for a good period of time. We’ve had guys push through and make the difference. In the biggest game, we weren’t able to push through.”’

‘The Amerks, two points behind eighth-place Houston for the final Western Conference playoff spot, have five games remaining. They play Saturday in Hamilton and Sunday in Glens Falls.’

Sabres thumbnails (Boston Globe)
Bruins expect unexpected (Boston Herald)
Boston Bruins close regular season against Buffalo Sabres (Quincy Patriot Ledger)
Bruins not expecting grudge match (Metro West Daily News)
Boston Bruins look to end regular season strong against Buffalo Sabres (Springfield Republican)
Buffalo (39-32-10) at Boston (48-29-4) (AP)
Buffalo Sabres (39-32-10) at Boston Bruins (48-29-4) (The Sports Network)
Bruins finish regular season, await playoff opponent (NHL.com)
First Things First… (BostonBruins.com)

‘After practice Buffalo sent Marcus Foligno and Corey Tropp back top Rochester. The Amerks are trying to get into the playoffs with a little over a week left in the season. Rochester’s in Hamilton Saturday and Glens Falls on Sunday.’

‘What if they didn’t set a franchise record with a 12 game road losing streak? 24 points up for grabs from December 17th in Pittsburgh through January 21st at St Louis and the Sabres got zero points. Injuries had taken a number of regulars out of the lineup but they managed to go 3-1-1 over that time in home games and you’d think they could have done better than score a measly 17 goals in those 12 road losses.’

‘“It was the same, but different. The same message, about don’t ever like losing. Don’t ever like making the mistakes you made. The chance to make a difference, and you didn’t make the difference. You get an opportunity to get paid to score goals, and prevent them if you’re a defender. We had two-on-ones that we didn’t score. We had a two-on-one where we went offside. That’s unacceptable. It’s game on time; it’s difference time. We’ve talked about this for a good period of time. We’ve had guys push through and make the difference. In the biggest game, we weren’t able to push through.”’