He's baaaaaaaaaack!

Huzzah!

Lindy must have been listening- he put Gerbe in the lineup tonight! I'm so thrilled! I literally did a little jump/dance in the kitchen when they said it on the pregame show. WOOOOHOOOO!

AND, not only is he in the lineup, he's playing well! Lots of energy, he's had a couple of hits (I love it when he hits people, they are all so much bigger!) and a shot or two I think. He's playing with Gaustad and Kaleta, which you may recall, was a solid like in the preseason.

And we pick it up early in the 2nd period.

EWWW Ottawa just scored.. rats. Enroth had been playing so well!

Vanek- you totally missed your man dude. NOt cool.

Golly-gee, but Goose grows such a foxy 2-day beard.

And speaking of the Goose, he just got hisself a sweet goal. Nice work by Leopold to put it on net and Goose to tip it. SOLID!

HONK!

Chris Neil is so disgusting. Why did he have to score? Puke.

Oh gross. Gerbe is playing with Roy and Stafford- the two worst Sabres. Why did you do that to him Lindy?

Interesting bench shot of Lindy getting all friendly and "father-like" in his chat with Adam.

..........

That's one thing I really miss about going TO the games-- being able to start at whoever I wish all night.

Beau-ti-ful breakaway by Pommers but Karlsson caught up to him at the last minute and poked it away. Rats.

Attaboy Enroth! Solid Save on Alfie, then Brennan grabbed it from the air.. good work boys!

Royzie- you're playing with some effort tonight! Keep trying and maybe you'll score. Get there, bro.

I don't like this behind the net camera angle- I need the whole picture!

Awwww.. Gerbs was right at the net and JUSTmissed scoring. Man. That was close- some real good pressure.

And WOW could they get LESS enthusiastic people for the Independent Health commercials?

............

Oh man Harry, Rick and Rayzor are hilarious tonight!

Holy crow, Karlsson has a serious mullet.

2nd period is over- WOW Sabres are owning on faceoffs, but have 10 giveaways! BAD.

The O'Brien/Boyd commercials are SO depressing! And LOLZ at the people on the Blue Cross Blue Shield ones.. hahaha awesome dance moves- looks like me out there!

Time for the 3rd period. Let's Go Buffalo!

oh we're getting feisty out there. Wow boys. Channel that energy!

Looking at the bench again, is it me, or does Luke Adam just look lost? I think he just has those crazy wide eyes.

(fangirl moment) I love how Gerbe's numbers get all pulled into his hockey pants because there's nowhere else for them to go.

Yay Gerbe was the labatt player profile. It's your night my man! Make it happen!!!

Awww... what an effort by Kaleta and Gaustad! Too bad the Sens knocked the net off.

I'm having way too much fun tweeting about this game. Haha

GERBE GOT THE CARRUBA COLLISION OF THE GAME!!!!!! It's really his night. It's meant me be- he needs to score it here and win this game!

And we're going to Oooooooooovertime!

Now I'm totally stalking his videos on Sabres.com because I'm a spaz. (I'm in love)

His hair is out of control tonight- sticking out through his helmet. Gosh he's been playing SO well!

Why is he at the bottom of that dogpile? Way to pick on the little guy. Chris Neil, you're a jerk.

Shooooooooooootout time:

Vanek- misses net. Whoops
Michalek- SAAVE by Enroth!
Boyes- SCOOOORES!
Spezza- Scores. BOOOOOO!
Pominville- Scoooooores!!!!!
Alfie- Scores. Poop.
Roy- (will prob score)...... he doesn't. Grr.
Condra- (who I thought was Bondra all night) WOOOOOOOO SAVE!!!
Staffy- Blocked. Nice try, bro.
Butler- He faked Enroth out for the goal. :(

UGH. That was a sad ending to a really good game. Stoopid Sens.
*shoulda put Gerbe in the shootout!*

YAY they are interviewing him! Love the long hair.. the scar on his lip is sexxxxxy and the neck beard is gross. LOL I could go on but I'll spare you. ;)

HAPPY NEW YEAR everybody! Tomorrow I'll post my Sabres "new year's resolutions"...

Gerbe-licious

First off- my mom and dad gave me a gift card for Christmas which will soon turn into a Nathan Gerbe jersey! :) Be sure I'll post pics when I get it.

now, for fun, since I just watched the Sabres Green team video, I'd like to break it down..



Follow along with me at home, folks.

First off, we have an interesting combo of Sabres players- Mike Weber and Nathan Gerbe. You may recall the original "green team" was Paul Gaustad and.. Ryan Miller? I forget who his partner in crime was.. then later it was Gaustad and Steve Montador for sure. I know that Weber was part of the activities of the Green team in the day, but he wasn't on the commercials before this year.

I find this particular commercial to be amusing- maybe it's just me. let's count the ways:
-In the freeze-frame before you start the video, they both look mad!
-Both guys look like they just woke up and haven't shaved in 3 days.
-The height difference- I know, it's old, but it will never not be funny. (and I love Gerbe and I'm totally okay with him being short, it's just amusing next to tall guys)
-the complete lack of expression on Gerbe's face. I don't think he moves a muscle other than his mouth. He barely even blinks!
-Weber's twitchy eyebrows. Seriously, check it out- his eyebrows are alive and moving of their own accord.
-Weber also talks out of the side of his mouth. It's kind of endearing.

... and I think that's about all I can critique for tonight. I'm "watching" the Sabres play the Caps right now.. so far so good. I really miss seeing Gerbe out there though! :( He practiced today- just skating, but at least that's a step. I want my man back.

It's my fault

Oops... I jinxed Gerbe.

Remember when I got my Derek Roy jersey for Christmas in 2007 and then the Sabres lost 10 games and then Royzie missed 4 games or something? Oh wait, you probably don't because I didn't have this blog then.. but I remember!

So Royzie has been my main man for as long as I've had a Sabre- his name is on my slug jersey, he's my dude. I've never had to wonder or worry about him having competition for the #1 spot. I like lots of Sabres but he was still the top dog.

Until Nathan Gerbe came along. Gerbe has slowly worked his way into my psyche and I can't seem to shake him. He's fun to watch and the more I read about him, the more I like him. He is one of those guys who really plays hard every night (like Derek Roy USED to be!) and I love that in a player. I am never not amused to see him line up against all the "big" boys. In general, I really just dig him.

That's not really news, I've talked about it here before.. and I was having a huge debate with myself before the season about getting a new Sabres jersey. I tried to go out on Slug appreciation day (and I was actually going to stick with Roy) but didn't make it to buy a new jersey that day. I thought I had made my mind up then- Roy had always been my Sabre, and I was going to stay loyal to him. But when I didn't get to buy a jersey that day, my resolve wavered.

A friend suggested that maybe the conflict it was because Roy missed so much of last season that I got used to seeing other players instead of him and once he was out there again the old love would return in full force.

Well the preseason started and then the season and they were both out there.... And I kept finding myself drawn to #42.

Houston, we have a problem.....

So I'd been raging about this issue- *silly in the grand scheme, but for me this is serious!* I've never had to choose between players before.

Then I decided to ask for a Sabres jersey for Christmas. And I want Gerbe on it, not Roy.

I made my decision public.. and that was good. It really wasn't a secret I liked Gerbe at this point anyway. No jinx yet (but then again, I don't have his jersey yet.)

Then I changed my facebook picture- to one of me standing in front of his portrait at the FNCenter. (first time I've seen his, it's on the 300 level and I hadn't been up there for 2 years)

And BOOM... next game out he leaves with a concussion and has yet to return.

So players beware, if I pick you, and publicly declare for you, you will most likely be either named to the all-star team (happened to a few of my minor league fellas) and/or injured/called up(if you're in the minors)/traded but one way or another, no longer playing.

Luckily for me, (and you, if you're said player), these absences are generally short-lived. I don't know why this happens to players that I like when I declare for them, but it seems to be a bad trend and I would like to publicly apologize for my bad juju. I just hope the curse doesn't re-assert itself once I actually get the jersey for Christmas!

Get well soon, Nathan Gerbe!

Perhaps it's time to get with it

I FINALLY have nothing to do tonight.. so I'm watching the Sabres game. So far, so good.

I keep tweeting about it but I figured if I was going to do that I should just live-blog it instead.

So here's what we have so far..

1st Period
-Kassian with a SICK pass to Villain (Leino, I like to call him villain) for the first Sabres goal. I really dig Kassian.. he can stay!

-Oh more Sabres scoring- Kassian himself gets one and then Vanek. WOOO it's 3-0!

-Miller OWNS the heck out of Jagr on a breakaway! WOOOO!

-The the lame-o Flyers score with 1 second left in the period and here we are, 3-1. Blah on that. Fun little fight between Tropp and some scrub from Philly- junior hockey style.

But oh how I miss Harry and Rick. I hate the stupid VS announcers- they never know what's going on. Eddie just called Tyler Ennis Nathan Gerbe for a whole replay- while we could ALL see that it was Ennis. *sigh*

2nd Period:
-Miller gets hit in the head with the puck without his mask. He's bleeding a little.. gets patched up and he's back at it. Cool. Hockey players are crazy.

-Bourdon hits Gerbe from behind- really hard into the boards.. NOOOO! Poor Gerbs is playing with who-knows-how-many stitches in his face as it is (from last Friday) and he leaves the ice after that hit. (according to twitter, he was holding his arm? that's BAD!) :( My poor boy.

-But nice work Matt Ellis to stick up for the little guy. :)

-Ewww the Flyers scored again. Gross. That one just bounced away from Miller. Can't have 'em all man. Crappy giveaway by Ehrhoff though!

... oh dear I left the room for a few mins to help my sis put away some groceries and the Flyers scored 2 goals! WHAT IS GOING ON?!?!

.. Okay it's the end of the 2nd. Get it together fellas..

3rd period

-I have been joined by my 5-yr old nephew. Maybe he'll be good luck for the Sabres.

-Just reported that Gerbe left with "upper body" injury... will not return. BOOOOOOO! :(:(

-GET WITH IT SABRES! 9:25 left.. let's do it!

-I LOVE the Discover commercials. The Tim Thomas one is hilarious. Sooo brilliant!

-And why do they show Sonic commercials when the closest Sonic is in Binghamton? I don't even like Sonic that much but it's just weird..

-yeesh Ryan Miller is having a rough night. he's had his mask knocked off twice.

-WOOOOOHOOOOOO! or should I say DREEEEEEEEEEEWWWWW!!!

Overtime

here we go..

-GRRRRRR That was SO not okay. Gragnani you are FIRED.

Have I mentioned lately how much I strongly dislike Claude Giroux? Because I CAN'T STAND THAT GUY! (Or anyone else on the Flyers for that matter)

:(

This was NOT how this game was supposed to go. Gerbe is hurt, the Sabres gave up (another) 3-goal lead, and then they lost. Gross all around.

I'm out.

sure

Perhaps I should write about how excited about the Sabres I am (totally) and remark upon their improved roster and their chances of making it happen this year.. but you've already read that from people who write better than me.

In the next week or so, I'll share with you some new nicknames, a hockey separated at birth (yeah, I still do those) and perhaps some informed hockey commentary (don't hold your breath).

But all I really can think about is seeing Derek Roy play again (I don't really count game 7 cuz he wasn't up to par) for the first time since last December, and my newfound love for Nathan Gerbe (that really has been building since 2008- go back and read posts tagged with his name if you don't believe me) and hoping that the boys (any of them!) do some fun "documentary" work like the 'Hawks did when they went overseas. The Sabres aren't known for their off-ice fun (at least not on the website) but maybe things are changing. I hope so because I love the player-run funtimes (take your cue from the Blackhawks my friends- they KNOW) and hopefully they will share their experience with the fans. :)

So let's go Buffalo! I'm ready to get this show on the road already..

Re-

The Sabres re-signed Gerbe! :) YAY! I really like him.

Now, as long as they also re-sign Montador and don't lose Roy or Goose, but get rid of Connolly, I don't care what else they do.

See, I'm pretty easy to please.

And the re-affiliation with the Amerks is a good thing for sure.

I'm pretty curious and excited to see what happens on Friday with free agency. The Sabres are (for once) buyers this time.

WOOHOO!

In other news, I re-subscribed to The Hockey News today. Yay!

what the what

I was joined at tonight's Sabres game by the one and only Heather B. and we had a great time.

The Sabres decided to show up tonight and played some solid defence-- and Ryan Miller was ON the money as well. Gerbe had a sweet goal that he worked hard for (seems to be a common refrain these days) and Vanek took advantage of a loose puck in front of Brodeur for the easy tap-in to make it 2-0. And there it stood for the rest of the game. (Vanek was all smiles after his goal- as well he should be- those are usually the ones that inexplicably get away!)

it was an excellent night. Heather and I had some quality conversation about the state of the Sabres and hockey and whatnot. :) We also got to get up close and personal with the Sabres and Devils (and Henrik Tallinder and Adam Mair- who I keep forgetting is a Devil. Amusingly enough, I found myself thinking Brad Boyes was Mair a few times tonight.. that's going to take some getting used to.) All in all, a wonderful game. Fitting for my last (regular season at least) game in our seats. We are not renewing the season tickets for next year, so it'll be back to scrapping up a few games a year in the 300 level. Bye 2nd row, it's been nice knowing you!

In other news, I am going to marry Nathan Gerbe and have his little fun-sized babies. (don't tell Derek Roy!) :) I love that man right now-- he is really turning it on and he works SO hard.

what a game

I feel like I should write something since I was at the game tonight (3rd in a row!) ..

It was an intense game and there were so many frickin Habs fans there it was annoying! The ones around us were mostly okay but the 2 girls in the row in front of us were just obnoxious. They weren't wearing any pants (tights are NOT pants) and we could see the one girl's underwear- classy, eh? Ugh and they kept standing up and pounding on the glass and smashing themselves on the glasss- it was gross. And then they kept yelling at the random Leafs fans behind us- 1967 *which is, of course, the last time the Leafs won the Cup.* Honestly, it was funny for about a minute- but they kept saying it.. and then we'd cheer "let's go Buffalo" and they'd say "Never won a Stanley Cup". Woo. It's the middle of the regular season. Montreal hasn't won since 1993 so get with the times. And they were only up by 1 goal but they were so cocky about it- so we cheered extra loud and hard when the Sabres scored. And during overtime, we all went NUTS and they just sat there and whimpered. HA!

The poor Canadiens though- they lost about a zillion players tonight- their guys were dropping like flies. That's never fun- and most of them were just random plays or getting hit by pucks or falling wrong. No fun at all.

Nathan Gerbe had a little scrum with (gaghurl) Scott Gomez. It was amazing. Gerbe rocks my socks. :) He's so feisty and little!

I really love it when the Sabres win when I'm there because I get to see Patrick Lalime do his little victory dance- it's so cute! He has different moves for each player too- he and Montador (whom I also love) have a strange sort of routine going on.. it's hilarious to watch. :) He may not be the best goalie, but I have a soft spot for Patty Lalime- he seems like a fun guy!

Speaking of Steve Montador- he is very flexible. He has a stretching routine he does before the start of each period and WOW it's nice to watch. Sorry, had to get that out there.

There were some serious bullshit penalties tonight. The "goalie interference" on Gerbe was crap- he got shoved into Price- not his fault! And the Kaleta one at the end of the period was uncool. It was right in front of me- he was shooting the puck AS the buzzer went off. He didn't know how much time was on the clock. Crappy call there too. But the ref made up for a little bit later on one of the calls, I forget which one. The Gomez high-sticking was a little scary- any lower and he would have removed Gerbe's head! It was vicious, and I'm glad they called it, even though he made little contact. I hate that punk.

It was a fun night overall. And I didn't have to beat anyone up- that was lucky. :)

what the?

Tonight might have been the first Derek Roy-less Sabres game I've been to since 2003 (before he was a Sabre). Crazy stuff. I miss my boy! (and I was stupidly excited to see the little interview him him on the website yesterday!)

So yeah.. about the game. WHAT THE HECK HAPPENED, BOYS?!

The first period was sweet. They came out hard and had a ton of shots and managed 2 quick scrappy goals. And I thought we might have a shot. Haha yeah right, this is the Sabres, remember?

Then they all forgot how to play hockey. No one was skating hard, no one was hitting (except Gerbe and Ennis- what the?), they were passing the puck to the Flyers.. it was ugly.

I thought Gerbe was decent tonight. He was all over the ice, hitting guys and scampering around like a maniac, but to no avail. He was trying though, which is more than I can say for some of the Sabres.

I still cannot stand Tim Connolly's play. WHY IS HE STILL A SABRE? I have said this over and over again- and tonight I heard at least 3 other people comment on the worthlessness of Connolly. UGH.

Stafford wasn't too good tonight, and neither was Pominville. These guys need to step it up.

Mike Weber looked like he was going to kill someone tonight. He is an intense looking dude. I was really noticing him- he was right in front of my face all night (our seats are in row 2, section 116, so right inside the blue line- where he is for faceoffs and such for 2 periods so he was standing out for me tonight.) He's taller than I thought.. and again, I wanted to see him bust someone's face. He and Carcillo might've made a nice bout.

Goose and Hartnell was a sweet fight. Then Hartnell gave away his stick while he was in the penalty box. I saw it happen- craziest thing ever- some kid comes over and he just passes it over the glass. WHOA. That was pretty cool, even though I can't stand him. Points for him.

I sat next to a random cute guy at the game. He and his buddy were Flyers fans (gross), but he was wearing a Winnipeg Jets Teemu Selanne jersey- random! SO of course I asked him about the jersey and he said he's been a Selanne fan forever. Cool, cool. And I asked if he actually liked the Jets or just Teemu to which he replied "I'm a Coyotes fan". Good for him. We sort of had a conversation, but I felt like he didn't want to talk to me. (he seemed impressed when I actually knew something about hockey..) It was entertaining enough- and he was cute-- and not rude about cheering for the flyers- he was cheering but being cool about it-- so yay for that.

Time to move on- unlike half of Buffalo, I'm not living in the past. Briere is gone- yes, I know- he scores on us all the time, that bastard- now GET OVER IT! Next game-Hurricanes.. bring it on! (no more Ray Whitney though, which is sad. I enjoyed seeing him!) I may be in attendance at the next game.. we'll see. Till then..

Pseudo-live blog

There are about 9 mins left in the game.. and the Sabres are up 4-3. WOOOO this game has been a little wild, what I've seen of it (I tuned in during the 2nd before the goals were scored..) It's been kinda up and down but at least they are doing SOMETHING. Lots of energy and action which has definitely been missing in some games lately.

And holy moley that Roy goal was amazing. And I particularly loved Gerbe hugging him. Teehee Gerbe is SOOOOOO tiny!

things are getting interesting.. Mair is getting speared in front of the linesmen and then one of them gets taken out.? Say whaaaaat?

Oh and speaking of say whaaat- how about Yoyo and Lecavalier fighting? That was strange but Yoyo was totally getting the best of Vinny. Awesome.

um the McDonalds McCafe commercial is strange..

C'mon guys.. 3.5 minutes left. Let's get another one, eh?

I love the "Let's Go Buffalo" chant I can HEAR! :)

(eeks thank goodness for autosave, because I kinda just accidentally deleted everything on the screen?)

WOOOOHOO Sabres win Sabres win! Yay! :) And they are going to interview Royzie in the post game. Huzzah! MMhhmm and wouldn't ya know, he got the memo- he's a bit scruffier than usual (at least a 2 day beard rather than just stubble)... it WORKS Derek, it works!

Quote of the night:
"He's obviously smaller than me, which is tough to ask for, in this league.."

AWESOME!

And on that note.. goodnight Buffalo.

I'm back

I just read some stuff on Sabres.com, including an interview with Nathan Gerbe. And now he and I are totally BFF with this one comment:

Who was your favorite player growing up?

"I would say Brian Gionta or Pavel Bure."


Dude, you just won my heart! <3333

Can we get married?

;)