...

Shots wound up being 32-26. Did not look like it. I'm just amazed they won. Somehow "fluke" doesn't apply although it should. Dahlin needs to be in the shoot out.

Stunning. It's not pretty, but clearly they're doing something right. Except Tage. WTF is he doing in the shoot out?

Would anyone on the current Sabres know Tyler Myers?

Fundamentally on the bolded. FWIW, I'm perfectly happy to be wrong. After preseason I thought TT would do a better job than he has. I have since revised my opinion on him and it's clear he needs to go down. Samson has, overall, under-performed as far as I see it. Obviously, there are other players on the roster who should go long before Samson, ideally. My issue is that we still need deeper scoring and Samson is one of the guys who should be providing that. IMHO, if he's going to be a utility guy, I don't think there's a need for yet another one on the roster. In a perfect world, he's the second line's Pominville or a third line threat. I don't like how he's being used now. He still has value as a potential whatever on another roster and he would likely get the biggest return of the guys not named Eichel or Skinner. I'll have to look up the metrics on Samson for this season so far when I have time. I have doubts he's any better at puck possession than anyone else on lines 2-4, and I have doubts he makes all players better when he's on the ice.

Because, apparently, it's more fun to pick on the kid, who, you know, made it big as a laughing stock.

Uhm. I don't recall if you supported getting rid of Kane and ROR. They were/are good players. The Sabres booted them - Sabres are better. Stats aren't everything. If they don't fit, they don't fit. And by that I mean the overall end-game for the team. You could put him on the third line and see what happens. Or, is his best use as an asset to draw in a better fitting player? He's not scoring at the necessary rate.

I would fully support that. McDermott is the reason Peterman is a national laughing stock.

I hope for the sake of the meat-heads out there who get off on this sort of thing Peterman doesn't have an iota of a chemical imbalance.

You have to be kidding me. You like it, so it's not bad. Whatever. It's bullying; beating up a guy who is already - clearly - down.

It's bullying. Way to go Sports Illustrated.

The Sabres will not dominate TB 4-1, that's not realistic. No one is "concerned" for the current group and what they're doing today. I put concerned in quotes because I think the connotation in context suggests those of us not jumping for joy over this win think the current Sabres aren't good. I don't think that's true, it's certainly not true for me. However, this win in particular showed us where we are at. If there's any concern it's that they lucked into a win here, and while a lot of people are saying it's a confidence building game, the players know it was a stolen game. There's not a lot to hang their hat on other than Hutton and luck for the win. If anything, that reality might not do for their confidence what most people here are saying it will - they might take from it they were lucky this time and that's it. Other than the 2 points this game, in the locker room, might not mean a thing. And that is a waste.

I know. Two rounds would be good based on what we've been seeing, but I still don't think they're there yet. Like I said at the beginning of this thread, they have made expecting anything possible - I'd like that expectation to stabilize.

Been there before. Now it's serious. So close, yet not close enough. I want to see some moves.

I'm sorry. I like the win, but this win has shown us where the team is at. The Sabres can be for real this season, but JBotts has some work to do. I want them to be serious contenders for a two round run.

They got hemmed in their zone too much and were poor on possession. In a series, the Sabres would get blasted by TB. We won, but the "resilience" thing is empty. They still need a winger for the Skinner-Eichel line and a D man who can bring the heavy yet be responsible.

I actually don't disagree with "Mulberry's" assessment. I like the win. They won. But they won by hanging on from the middle of the 2nd period to the end of the game. I'm not complaining, but I would have liked to have seen just a little more.

The Hutt and his goal posts won that game.

So, just got to the thread. First period they made HCPH and JBotts look brilliant. Second period not so much, although I get the impression that TB is turning it on more than usual to try and win this game.

Yeah. I don't like Pierre. Doc really doesn't bother me.

I don't think there's any way to predict how this will turn out: blow-out, win, OT, close loss, aliens landing center ice, shut out for The Hutt, etc. etc. Which is not to say the Sabres have been terribly inconsistent, it's just that they've made it easy to expect a full spectrum of outcomes.

I could very well be their analytics are painting a specific picture compared to the upcoming competition. Perhaps Pommensteinski placed on those lower lines is meant to jump-start them. Maybe he's credited internally for helping Skinner-Eichel get it together.

This conversation is interesting. Pommers' speed, or lack thereof, might have been an asset on the Eichel line because, while his legs were able, we had just enough turbo boost and speed to position himself properly while Jack and Skinny attracted all of the attention. Now that his legs have worn out, maybe he can't quite keep up. He'll likely ride that see-saw all season. Meantime, I view Samson as a perfect candidate to fill in that role, assuming he's been paying attention to how Pommers was doing what he was doing. I seem to recall having the impression that Samson was getting clogged up on the boards a lot of the time in the past when playing with Jack. With Skinny playing the role Samson was formerly expected to fulfill with Jack, maybe there's a chance it works.

More importantly, it worked.

And so...?

People with their eyes closed to this "phenomenon" don't want to believe the impact. The parallels to life and reality at large are many and significant.