Buffalo Sabres Lead in Quarterfinals against Philadelphia Flyers in Overtime Win 4-3 –NHL Play-offs
Buffalo Sabres placed the second seed of the Eastern Conference, Philadelphia Flyers, on the edge of elimination after they regained the lead in the quarterfinals series on Friday night. Tyler Ennis scored the overtime game winner for Sabres during Game
5 to overcome the Flyers by 4-3, at the sold out Wells Fargo Centre in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Buffalo won their second consecutive match to gain a much needed lead that will have Philadelphia dealing with the chances of elimination in game six.
Before getting the game winner, Tyler Ennis scored the opening goal of the match early into the first period.
He along with Thomas Vanek scored 1:24 apart from each other. Both shots taken bounced off the pads of Flyers’ goalie, Brian Boucher, and into the net.
Philadelphia had given the Sabres a 5-on-3 man advantage in the final five minutes of the heated competition on which Marc-Andre Gragnani scored his first of the series to extend their lead to 3-0 by the end of the initial period.
The crowd went into a nail-biting situation which was luckily dealt with in the second and third periods when Flyers made a comeback.
Just when it was looking good for Sabres, James van Riemsdyk and Andrej Meszaros brought down the lead within a goals reach.
Both Philadelphia forwards went into attacking mode and scored twice within two minutes of each other. Riemsdyk fought for the puck inside Sabres goalie Ryan Miller’s crease and eventually pushed it past him, Meszaros added his first of the series and finished
the period 3-2.
Boucher was pulled out of the game after 15 minutes when he allowed those first three goals by Buffalo on only 11 attempts.
He was replaced by the backup, Michael Leighton, who played well for the remainder of the match making 20 rejections on 21 attempts.
On the other hand, Miller made 36 saves and only let three through him. Since Boucher is having trouble facing Sabres, it is most likely that Leighton will be starting off game six for Flyers.
"I'd very much like to redeem myself", Boucher said. "Like I said, it was my responsibility tonight. I take ownership in that. To put your team in a hole like that, they didn't deserve that".
Danny Briere made the tying goal in the final period. He fired a shot from the circle at the 3:36 mark on the clock.
There was enough time for both teams to still take the matchup but after remaining scoreless for the remaining 17 minutes, overtime was inevitable.
Sabres will be returning home extremely happy after Ennis won the match for them in overtime.
Flyers will fly out to Buffalo on Sunday in an attempt to win game-six to keep them alive in the Eastern Conference quarterfinals.
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