Whoa, Kevin’s sweaters are switching it up tonight, all crowding over to one side of the screen. I think it’s because they’re so excited to see me again. Aw! I missed you guys, too!
Kevin launches into the epic tale of how everyone and their grandmother was either injured or traded or absent or brain-scrambled for this game, so the Sabres had to make about a million call-ups from
First Period
18:25 There’s some sort of strange tag-team move where Soupy takes Battaglia down behind the net, and Mair piles on top of him for good measure. Despite the blatant pushing, shoving, and squashing,
16:47 Pommer and Roy head in shorthanded, and Derek, as is his nature, ends up sitting on the ice. He still makes a pretty good pass through the crease, though. Hey, I guess if you’re going to fall down (or get taken down) as much as he does, you should at least know what you’re doing once you’re down there. By the way, aside from this moment this penalty kill has been brought to you by suck. (Actually it’s been brought to you by Napa Auto Parts, so don’t ever buy anything from there. It probably sucks.)
16:23 Just as that penalty expires, Vanek goes after Colaiacovo like he’s a particularly delicious baby he wants to kill. Here comes some more Napa-sponsored suck!
15:22 RJ gets inordinately excited about a shorthanded two-on-one that comes to naught when Pommer can’t get it to Tallinder. It takes me a second to get over my shock at the fact that so many Sabres are injured and Hank isn't one of them. This is a joyous occasion.
14:24 Miller, falling, just manages to get his glove up in time to block a shot from Steen in the last second of the penalty. Okay, this penalty kill was a considerable improvement (Miller wasn’t doing ALL the work), but can we please get some shots now?
13:33 After Peters and Gill get shovey along the boards, the players form what looks like a hug train in order to spread calm and peace and the message of love. Aw.
12:46 Lydman saves Millers ass as he blocks a point-blank shot from Sundin in front of a wide-open net. And everyone thought it was only Drury who did that! (Seriously, guys, can we take a shot on net please? At this point I’m not entirely sure Raycroft is down there, that’s how little I’ve seen of him.)
12:17 Vanek obliges, taking a drop pass from MacArthur and getting a nice shot from just outside the circle. He continues to work for the puck in front of the net, and gets a couple more chances before drawing a penalty. It’s after plays like that that I feel really confident about that humongo contract.
10:22
9:19 This time it’s Tallinder who takes excellent care of his out-of-position goaltender by intercepting a pass at the side of the net. Okay,
7:37 It’s so quiet in the ACC that you can hear one, lone guy yelling “Go Leafs Go.” Gotta love those passionate Canadian home crowds.
6:20 Lydman gets a good shot from between the circles (it seems the defense has to do everything around here), and
5:53 Well, I don’t know what I’d get him, but Pominville apparently got him a goal! MacArthur nearly scores on a neat backhand, and Pommer is there to bang in the rebound. Perhaps aware of how enraged and murderous Thomas Vanek gets about new births in Pominville, RJ refrains from announcing that the population has increased.
5:05 Pommer, all excited and wriggly over his recent success, tries to clear the puck in front, but ends up both fanning and falling. Aw, Lindy, who needs kittens when you’ve got this?
3:13 After a great shift by his line on the power play (I know!), Staffy tries to muscle the puck out from under McCabe, who is down on the ice, but ends up getting the entire Leafs team on his back instead.
2:35 You know, I was just wondering where Hecht was in this game! He fancy-skates himself over the line and through some defenders to shoot from the slot. It deflects wide, but that was still a pretty neat play. Alternate captain Yo-Yo is in the house!
0:00 Well, period one has been somewhat underwhelming. I suppose I can cut them some slack, though, what with the absences and the short bench and whatnot. Plus, my from-the-future powers tell me there’s much more to come.
Second Period
20:00 Jim starts off the period by talking about Marty and what a sad atmosphere his departure created with the team. I think this is the part where Briere, watching the game from his hotel room, picks up the phone and leaves his 403rd voicemail comprised entirely of unintelligible sobbing. (And yes, I am making jokes to avoid having to relive the pain of losing Marty. What of it? At least I’m not soothing my heartache by whoring myself out to Philly. Unlike someone I know.)
18:59 Miller leaves his net. Disaster ensues. The only thing surprising about that situation is that Hank was the one who lost the puck, which is what forced Miller to have to dive across his crease like he was sliding into home. Okay, unusually sloppy for Hank, but still: What the hell were you doing all the way over in the corner, Ryan?
18:38
17:21 Someone taps the puck back to the point off of the faceoff, and RJ tells us it is “Vanek or Peters.” Wow. God knows I’m terrible at reading numbers, and that wasn’t exactly a play that required much skill, so I’m not trying to make fun of RJ’s commentating, here. I just think I would be remiss in my duties as a recapper if I let the one moment in all of history when Peters was mistaken for Vanek pass by without proper documentation.
15:50 Hecht makes a gorgeous pass through the goal crease, but Ryan can’t connect on it. I suspect it’s because he had to take that extra second to check and make sure it was
15:43 Hank gets credit for “flattening” Ponikarovsky, when all he really did was sort of lean on him until they both collapsed. It’s like someone was trying to build a house of cards using hockey players, but couldn’t get the first two to stand up properly. It’s… weird.
15:05
12:42 After collecting a shot and sending it up ice, Paetsch is run over by Belak outside the range of the camera. According to RJ, Mair then steps up to lay a little revenge on Belak. MSG, why am I not seeing this? (Instead, I get to see Kaleta completely flip a guy over in the corner, which, admittedly, is cool.)
12:22 As we head to commercial, Mair is chomping his mouth guard on the bench, and it turns out my eyes (and Google video’s pixels) weren’t deceiving me last game: He most definitely has a black eye. And it is wicked. (Reports of eyeliner are, as of yet, unconfirmed.)
11:12 The shot tally tells me that the Sabres only have two shots in this period, while the Leafs have nine. I feel like I’m being lied to.
11:00 After Sundin blocks one of his own team’s shots, Vanek roars in on a breakaway, only to shoot it wide of the net. And I wonder why the shot count seems so low.
8:46 The Leafs spend the better part of two minutes in the Buffalo zone, but don’t manage to get a single shot, or even do anything which requires RJ to say more than “So-and-so has it along the boards/at he blue line/behind the net.” Judging by the way the fans choose this moment to start cheering “Go Leafs Go” with real vigor, I think we’ve finally found the target fanbase for the Buffalo-style power play.
8:01
6:27 Gill steps into Ryan at the blue line. Hey, don’t bite the hand that feeds you,
4:33 Patches looks all kinds of clueless as he stands uselessly in front of the net while
4:12 Sure, of all the players who could have scored, it had to be Ponikarovsky. Listen, Ponikarovsky, your name is fun to say, but way to intense to type. Don’t you have a snappy nickname or something I can use instead? How do you feel about Ponk? (By the way, the last three minutes of play wouldn’t have looked any different if the entire
1:33 Hey, look! The Sabres discover that not only is there more ice down there, there’s another net, too. And they can score on it! After some really neat, precise passing by Hecht’s line (hey, I like the sound of that!), Lydman lets a wrister go from the point, and Hecht, replay shows, deflects it in. The cute part is when Yo-Yo realizes he’s scored and begins to celebrate only to turn around and see everyone congratulating Toni instead. It’s like they’ve never heard of anything as preposterous as Hecht scoring a goal before. In the post-goal huddle, Toni and Yo-Yo engage in adorable “Did I score that, or did you?” antics, and even though Yo-Yo clearly knows the truth, he lets Toni go partake in the bench fist-bump anyway. Aw, how gentlemanly of him.
Third Period
20:00 Jim goes over the list of injured Leafs, and mentions that Darcy Tucker (Hey, he’s out! I was wondering why my eyes hadn’t felt like vomiting yet!) just signed a brand-new extension. Mike Peca, on the other hand, has let the media know how much it has always been his dream to play in Toronto in the year 2008, but only if they get him his extension by the end of the week. And he really means it this time. Not like last week.
18:13
17:50 Kaleta flattens McCabe at the red line, and the crowd inexplicably erupts into cheers. I would say they’re yelling for some sort of penalty, but considering they were just booing McCabe a few seconds ago, it seems more likely that the Sabres’ strategy of wearing their home blue sweaters has tricked them into thinking they’re
15:54 Soupy knocks Stajan down in front of the net, and if there’s any sign of appreciation or outrage from the fans, it’s at catipillar-wearing-slippers-on-shag-carpet levels of audibility. Now it’s like the Sabres’ strategy of wearing their home blue sweaters has made the crowd forget that they were hockey fans in the first place. (The Slug has been known to have that effect.)
15:31 Vanek has his legs taken out from under him in the crease, as he’s about to score on a wide open net no less, and the ref takes a second to make sure that 26 isn’t a 9 before blowing his whistle.
14:37 Apparently Aubin has never heard of anything as preposterous as Hecht scoring a goal either, as he just assumes Yo-Yo is going to pass instead of shoot and leaves the entire short side of the net wide open. This time Hecht fires it in clean and gets the celebration huddle all to himself. By the way, Patches made a fantastic assist pass from the blue line, here.
14:30 RJ reminds us yet again that Briere is out with the flu, and that Hecht is filling in for him at center. Considering all of long-distance phone calls to Philadelphia Danny’s no doubt made by this point in the game, I think it’s more accurate to say he’s out with the Phlu.
12:40
12:24 And of course, Jim says
10:00 Roy pulls some positively Afinogenov-esque moves as he steals the puck, spins, falls to his knees, gets up, loses control, spins again and passes to Vanek right in the goal mouth. Holy cow, that was awesome! But apparently not awesome enough for Vanek to score off of, as Aubin just manages to cover up.
9:52 Dude. Ty Conklin is hot.
9:13 The puck takes a crazy bounce up onto the top of the Sabres net, narrowly missing the open corner. Some Leaf seems to think it’s a good idea to attempt poking the puck off with his stick, before the ref reaches in and grabs it, explaining that God gave humans hands for a reason, and that reason is so that we don’t look like idiots trying to do everything with a hockey stick.
7:52 Staffy does a neat drag through a defender, but his backhand attempt is turned away. Still, it’s so impressive that the crowd thinks they’re
6:40 Hecht’s line (which entails Pommer and Ryan) just did a fantastic job of working the zone in the past minute or so. Yo-Yo in particular had great puck possession and even set up one or two chances for his wingers. I think being a center with a letter suits him perfectly. (Hint, hint, wink, wink, Lindy.)
6:10 MacArthur takes a great pass from Mair, maneuvers past the out-of-play Aubin, and shovels the puck into the open net for his third point of the night. Man, I kind of wish the General could wear that Slug season-long. (And not just because I want an excuse to call him “the General” more often.)
4:15 RJ wants us to know that he’s not making it up when he says that Green passes to White. In a league where European names are butchered and giggled at on a regular basis, leave it to RJ to point out that, hey, white-bread names can sound ridiculous, too!
2:55 MacArthur draws two penalties in an interval of 20 seconds. It seems the General possesses both an enticingly elbowable head and irresistibly trippable ankles. He is a clear asset. (Also, is it just me, or have these teams been incredibly well-behaved tonight? The last penalty seems like it was about four months ago.)
1:00 Listen, Leafs, I know there’s only one minute left in the game, but I’m from the future, and I promise you: If you can just take this game to overtime you will make it to the playoffs. So get going on those five goals! Heh heh heh.
0:00 The game ends in the most anti-climactic of fashions, with the home fans booing robustly, and a pointless face-off after Aubin freezes the puck with just 5 seconds left. But at least it wasn’t a shootout! (And by the way, Leafs, in case you forgot, a shootout would have meant playoffs. Just saying.)
Okay, folks, I think that just about does it for me with these game diaries. I fully intended to go ahead and recap the next game, but I’m pretty burnt out. Especially since the next Game to Remember is against the Leafs again. I mean, there’s only so many times you can make the same “Hey, if only you managed not to surrender that substantial lead in the third period, you’d have been in the playoffs!” joke before it starts getting old. (For you, not for me. I could make those jokes all day long.) Also, real live hockey will be starting up in just over two weeks (!!!), and it will certainly take me longer than that to finish a game diary. I don’t want to live in the past. Anyway, I hope you all have enjoyed reading these as much as I’ve enjoyed writing them. They certainly did help this interminable summer pass.
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