Sabres beat Candiens 5 to 3
While the Buffalo Sabres should be particularly pleased with their effort against the Montreal Canadiens after scoring 5 times, the Canadiens couldn’t feel satisfied. There were obvious shortcoming in their game and the Canadiens know it. One particular
area that the Canadiens need to sort out before the regular season would have to be power plays.
The Canadiens gave up 3 power plays against Buffalo on Thursday nights. The Buffalo Sabres on the other hand were nowhere near as generous and conceded no power play goals through the night. The efforts were markedly different. With a man advantage the sabres
took six shots on the goal while the Canadiens took none.
Montreal Canadiens’ new Captain Brian Gionta said that right from the starts their movements weren’t the way they would have hoped for during penalty kills. “Too many mistakes, not moving our feet, getting outworked and getting beat to pucks,” Gionta said.
He further added that the Canadiens would work on their special teams in their upcoming final preseason game.
Canadiens Coach, Jacques Martin, too emphasized the importance of special teams saying that they dictate the outcome of games but he cautioned against making hurried judgments based on the preseason. A lot of Montreal’s veterans were not on the Ice for Thursday
night’s game. “Once we get our people back I think that'll help our performance on the power play,” said Martin.
On the Sabres side the talk of the Town was Luke Adam. The 20-year-old bagged two of Thursday nights 5 goals on the Sabres side. Adam was drafted 44th in the 2008 draft by the Sabres but has not seen NHL action yet. “I've just been trying to focus
on the little things and hope big things come of that. It worked tonight,” Adam said. His two goals would also go a long way to help his NHL career.
Comparing talent the Sabres and the Canadiens decided to put on the ice, it makes sense that the Canadiens were beaten. But the Canadiens at this point must really be wondering if they even tried. Sabres not only outperformed but also outworked the Canadiens.
From the very first period the Sabres’ were clearly in the game. They took 14 shots on the goal in the first 20 minutes and were able to score once. The Canadiens goal tender, Alex Auld, stopped 13 of those shots to keep Montreal in the game. Despite suffering
defeat, the goaltender was able to see a silver lining on Thursday night. “It was the first chance I’ve had to get a lot of shots and see a lot of pucks which was nice,” Auld said. He added that the game offered a continuous challenge as he had to stop shot
after shot. In the 3 periods, 20 minutes each, that Auld was on the net, he stopped 32 shots in total. That comes out to be a shot on goal every other minute.
Jhonas Enroth on the other hand faced just six shots from the Canadiens in the first period and successfully blocked them all. In total, Montreal had 31 shots on the goal, 28 of which were stopped. The sole goal of the first period came in the power play
for the Sabres. In the 4th minute, off assists from Tyler Myers and Derek Roy, winger Thomas Vanek was able to score for the Sabres.
The second period saw a lot more action than the first. In the second minute of the period the Sabres had already scored their second goal and Luke Adam had scored his first. Adam didn’t need an assist to score the goal. Just 15 seconds later the Canadiens
came back with their own goal. Mathieu Darche put the puck in the net with a wrist shot, also without an assist.
The Canadiens would score the equalizer within 2 minutes of Darche’s goal. The second Montreal goal came off Ryan O’Byrne’s stick. The goal was followed by Buffalo’s Tim Connolly and Luke Adam’s goals for the Sabres. Within the first 10 minutes of the second
period 5 goals were scored, one of them during a power play. The period saw 23 shots on goal.
In the third both teams scored only once leaving the Sabres with a 2 goal lead to win Thursday’s game.
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