who are these Sabres and CAN WE KEEP 'EM?

Whoooaa Nelly the Sabres just won 2 in a row, outscoring their opponents 13-3! Brilliant.

Last night's game was just awsome. They played so controlled and outworked the 'Canes all over the ice and it paid off. They remembered that hard work CAN win hockey games and playing with a little heart and some grit will get you a loooong way. They outmuscled, outhustled and flat outplayed the Hurricanes and it was extremely gratifying. Roy had 2 goals and 1 assist too so that was grand. It was just a very COMPLETE game. and it was fun to watch. :)

Tonight wasn't too bad. They played well from the start, got a lead of 1-0 and were rollin for a while, then when Toronto scored, they came right back and put another one in.. then one more for good measure. It was 3-1 after the first, the 2nd came and went, then the Leafs had a PP and put one in to close the gap again. There were signs of returning to the old we-dont-care-and-forget-that-a-hockey-game-is-60-minues Sabres but they held it together. Actually they did more than just hold it together. They settled down and Pommers scored a goal on an amazing passing play by Hecht and Gaustad to make it 4-2 and a Paille and Tallinder chipped in 2 more to really put the game out of reach. Miller stepped up again with some killer saves and all the little new D-men played extremely well too. Yay for TEAM EFFORT. There were a ton of blocked shots tonight too.

Oh and has anyone noticed how little ice time Vanek has had in the last couple of games? (and how he's been invisible when he was out there? ) He played 9 mins tonight and was a -1, (same with Afinogenov) last night the Sabres scored 7 goals and he was even.. which means he was out there for either NO Sabres goals or 1 Sabres goal and the Carolina one. Yeesh. I know +/- is not the end-all, be-all stat that some people make it out to be, but it can be telling about certain things. Some other good stats- the Sabres have 8 players with at least 10 goals, (Goose and Max have 9), 4 with at least 20 (Roy has 29 and Vanek has 28, while Hecht has 19 and Paille has 18) and every guy on the roster except the 2 goalies, Funk (7 games in but he's a D-man) , Weber and Gragnani (who have played 2 games each) have at least 1 goal. That's called scoring by committee and it's a great thing!

More random stats to ponder
- Vanek leads the team in shots (and whiffs) at 213
-Dan Paille owns the shooting % category with 18.8% accuracy (18 goals on 96 shots)
-Vanek has 15 PP goals. This could account for his poor -4 rating when he's 3rd on the team in scoring
-Pommers leads the team in +/- with 17 (Roy is 2nd with 14)
-Paille and Roy have 3 shorthanded goals each, accounting for 3/4 of the team's total SHG output
-Staffy has 5 game winning goals (Vanek has 7)
-Timmy Connolly wins the Lady Byng trophy with 8 PIMS in 48 games. Mike Weber has 12 in 7
-and Goose OWNS of faceoffs- with an 80% success rate tonight and 54% on the season. Roy is just over 50% for the season.
-Spacek leads Sabres players for Time on Ice- just over 23 mins/game
-Roy leads Sabres forwards at 20:55

Okay, I think I'm done! I love stats.. can you tell? LOL

And one more Un-Sabres thing. Marty Brodeur reached his 40th win tonight! (for the record 7th time) Good job Marty!