Taro T

Hate last minute goals. Belleville 3 - TO 1 End of 2.

Didn't realize that Belleville still had something to play for. If they win, they can still catch Laval for 3rd place & not have to mess around w/ the opening round series against TO or Ra-cha-cha. Laval plays Syracuse today. Not sure what they'd need (a win or just getting to OT to stay ahead of Belleville). Belleville needs to win & have Laval lose in Regulation to flip seeds. Past the midway point of regulation & it is still Belleville up by 3-0.

13:46 left in the 2nd.

3-0 Belleville.

He didn't NEED to be a leader here, but reality is he WAS one of the leaders on this team and he had an influence on the culture. Also, Tuch wasn't here when the trade w/ Florida went down and pretty sure neither Pysyk nor Anderson was a Sabre at that point either. Adams had a plan & stuck to it.

Still have 3 picks left. Talking heads saying they've gotten good value on the guys they have picked (maybe not the LB, but they needed a 3rd guy) so could see them not going there yet w/ already re-signing Bates & grabbing a few in FA.

He needed to be in a place where he wasn't a leader. Pretty sure the trade will work out for everyone.

Still 1-0 after 1.

Good. Haack was way too inconsistent.

Doesn't take much, does it. 😛

Nerve wracking watching the clock stop. 😉 Under 5 to go in the 1st; still 1-0.

Still not convinced that the Sabres couldn't have improved with Eichel & Reinhart & Ristolainen, etc. But they definitely needed at least 2 more Alex Tuchs to go w/ the 1 they have plus still having Okposo & Girgensons around for it to be possible. And realistically, that kind of influx of talent wouldn't be possible without moving pieces. So, though it may have been possible technically, it wasn't realistically unless they happened to luck into the next Hasek that was good enough to cover up a lot of flaws/ dysfunctions. Mia culpa. That former core/leadership guys like Bogosian or Reinhart can be a component of successful teams show that w/ enough established talent/culture that former core can be useful components, but don't want ANY of them (w/ the possible exception of McCabe) anywhere near a letter. That core was completely lacking leadership w/in it. And Reinhart is a 3rd liner on Florida & Bogosian is 3rd pairing in Tampa. AMAZING how good a 75 point season can feel when everybody is actually on the same page. It's still 6 points worse than Murray's best squad (best, 81 points is best, how pathetic) but feels so much better even though there was hope after that year as well because there was so little hope since then. Hope Adams can actually figure out the goaltending question, not just for the obvious reason that the team we cheer for will be good, but because he seems to be a good guy & it would be nice for him & Granato, another that seems to genuinely be a good person, to have legit success. (And not just a recent Sabres version of success.)

Seems like this guy is being billed as a poor man's Deebo Samuel. Which makes it seem that they've found Isaiah MacKenzie's replacement in a year or 2.

Bills traded up in the 5th. Moved to 148. Gave up their 5th & a 6th (206).

What a strange game. The Sabres coming out flat (there's a reason the Okposo line gets 1st at bat 😉 ) seemed to take the crowd out of it. Was in this building w/4,000 fans when the crowd was louder. But then we finally got that Thompson goal and the atmosphere from the Banner Night was back. The crowd turned electric & the Sabres fed off it. So great that it was Power that tied it. He had gaffes early, but he didn't dwell on them, and bounced back very nicely. That he could do so was a tribute to Granato. And Granato going to the "usual" lines in the 3rd seemed to help too. Passes started hitting sticks as guys knew where his linemates were going. And, really happy for Mittelstadt to get to be remembered forever. Anytime somebody replays RJ's last goal call, he'll be the one RJ is talking about. Lucky him. And, in the, 'lucky me' department. In the 3rd, at a couple of TV timeouts, Jeanneret would stand up & wave to the crowd. This kid expected him to do so at the end, so while pretty much everybody else was watching Thompson hug Mitts, this kid turned his back to the play & watched for RJ to pop back up again. He did, to just soak it all in it seemed, but he seemed to notice me jumping up & pointing at him waving one of those T-shirts he wore the home game prior to the Banner Night, and he waved back. Maybe it was just in general to the crowd, but he was looking right at me. That wave, that's what I'm going to remember forever. He sat back down & finished up what he had to do, then popped up 1 final time & waved to everybody before heading down to the ice. But, I'm keeping my moment.

Yep. They also played briefly, prior to the He Man thing, the '90's "I've Got the Power" song (C& C Music Factory maybe?). They need to drop the few shekels it would take to get that bit w/ that song from Bruce Almighty for the Video Board when he scores. MHO. YMMV.

Haven't seen them play w/out Okposo in a while. Just sayin'. 😉

And to think, there were some who bemoaned actually getting SOMETHING for him.

IMHO, the is little doubt that they'll come out of the gate quickly & look like a playoff team in October. Where the rubber meets the road will be November once the better teams are back into getting up for the RS games again. If they start slowly, it'll be an 'oh, (shoot)' moment & might have them in the Berard derby afterall. That'd be a tragic outcome, wasting the goodwill they've generated since March.

Would truly not mind Anderson back IF it is strictly as the backup / emergency goalie. Don't want him anywhere near the #1 role. Maybe UPL's injury last night opens up the opportunity for that.

Pysyk will be interesting. Would like to know if the team's talked to him about coming back as the #7 & whether he'd be amenable to it.

16k was a good guess. It looked like only ~500-1,000 of the STH seats were empty. That 16,505 # was tickets sold. Would really like to see "turnstyle" counts of the crowd announced but understand why they don't do that. And if there were 16k, that leaves 6,000 people who paid money to be at the game that DIDN'T get the T-shirt they gave away. "Fan appreciation" indeed.

Absolutely. And it is a true testament to the character of this team that the constant parade of losing rarely seemed on the verge of breaking them and never did break them. Many on this team did take strides & on the whole the team did develop. But, at the end of the day, how much more could they have gained development-wise if they were playing meaningful games beyond early January? How much of an extra 1/2 step might they have had playing w/ the adrenaline that comes w/ knowing they have to find a way to win this game pumping through their veins? Mia culpa. Thought this team would end up w/ 4 fewer points & 4-5 spots lower in the standings. But, how much better could both the season & the development have been w/ Ullmark or comparable between the pipes? We'll never get to know that.

It probably will be a significant portion of this summer's conversation 'round here. Where is this team REALLY right now? Is it the worst in the league that it showed from November to March, the playoff level team it was after the calendar flipped to March, or something in between? Pretty sure most would say in between. They took a strange road to get there, but the standings say they're in the same class as teams like San Jose and Ottawa and that seems about right all things considered. Would like to think they should be w/ the Aisles & Jets right now, but if this EXACT same team came back expect the goaltending would doom them to be a step back from that. On paper this team'll need to find 21-25 points to reach the playoffs next year, but their skaters probably are good enough that they should be an Aisles level team today, so simply getting league average goaltending gets them 9 or 10 of them. (We can hope, right?) Would also agree with Okposo that they did seem to be preparing different down the stretch. The coach started to match lines regularly. When things weren't working, lines & pairings changed in game, and when Bjork & Hayden were in the lineup the bench shortened significantly in the 3rd. Didn't see the 4th line out at all in the 3rd. (Maybe Krebs caught a shift somewhere, but didn't notice him and had been looking.) Earlier in the year, except for the rare experimentation, e.g. playing Cozens vs McDavid, there was little line matching & almost no shortening of the bench nor situational deployment adjustment. So, they probably could've won a few more games early in the year w/ a more standard coaching philosophy. Though the question remains, though the Sabres did seem focused & not necessarily loose, did their playoff caliber opponents take them seriously? Even if Kyle is right & their results shouldn't be discounted because they were focused & preparing as professionals, were their opponents able to bring their A games against what the standings said were significantly inferior opponents. Will be interesting to see if Adams can bring in those 3-4 pieces many here expect (1G, 2RD, 4C, maybe another F) to see him get. Will also be interesting to see how much another full off-season will benefit the kids. And it likely can't be understated how much an off-season w/out drama will help them in staying focused. Somewhat unrelated note. Will also be interesting to see how many teams seem to want to challenge the Yotes for 32nd next year. If there's more than 1 or 2, that might skew next year's standings some. If there's a bunch, that'll help them get more points in the RS. And not sure if that'll make it easier or harder to claw into the playoffs.