GDT/ Buffalo Sabres @ Edmonton Oilers Thurs. 3/21- 9pm MSG, ESPN+ and WGR Radio

[Wyldnwoody44]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:23 PM, ska-T Chitown said:

I specifically did not mention which side of the debate I would be on, nor will I do so now. I shall not take your bait, however masterful it may be. Good day to you, sir. Good. Day.

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To be fair... I honestly have no clue what the rumors or speculation are about him. I'm fairly hermit like when it comes to a lot of these things. SS is basically my only social media aside from tidbits I hear from nurses at work 😂. 

Life is better this way 

 

 

As for the game... 

Edited March 21, 2024 by Wyldnwoody44

[ska-T Palmtown]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:29 PM, Wyldnwoody44 said:

To be fair... I honestly have no clue what the rumors or speculation are about him. I'm fairly hermit like when it comes to a lot of these things. SS is basically my only social media aside from tidbits I hear from nurses at work 😂. 

Life is better this way 

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haha, yeah - totally get that. It can be tough to keep up with everything with the 100's of options to follow. I was just having some fun on a particularly slow WFH home day while I wait for our suppliers to actually do things so I can do my job 🙂

[Stoner]

If anyone masterfully baits, it's Woody.

[Brawndo]

UPL in net

[bob_sauve28]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:41 PM, Brawndo said:

UPL in net

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Hopefully next year, we have two solid goalies

[Brawndo]

Granato looked at VO’s Game against Vancouver and sits Robinson. Gotcha 

[Mustache of God]

  On 3/21/2024 at 4:35 PM, CallawaySabres said:

Islanders over Wings tonight

Sabres over Oilers tonight

Tomorrow 3 points out....just sayin

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We all know this game is going to OT with another Islander loss.

[Brawndo]

 

[Thorner]

  On 3/21/2024 at 2:16 PM, sabrefanday1 said:

Totally agree that this "comning close" every year is only serving the purpose of give false hope to all of us and gives KA more reason to keep meatballs and his coaching staff.  Yep we have players that apparently want to be here but as noted are we any better?  

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Honestly, I’m not as worried about it this time because literally anyone could see we aren’t coming close due to fantastic overall play, it’s because of how low the cut off would be. We’ll be close to 90 points maybe, but thinking and planning for that to be the cut off next year would be a massive mistake

never mind configuring a roster to be “potentially” good enough to hit your bare minimum 

Edited March 21, 2024 by Thorny

[Thorner]

  On 3/21/2024 at 2:55 PM, inkman said:

They’ll be closer to the cap next season. Dahlin, Power and UPL all getting significant raises.  I know a few contracts come off the books, most notably Olofsson, they’ll more than use up what he voids with those 3.  Probably to the tune of 15-20mill.  

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Doesn’t get any easier 

- - - 

As for today: we are almost cooked, but not quite done. A win today keeps things alive 

  On 3/21/2024 at 3:12 PM, ska-T Chitown said:

Personally, the only false hope I get from it is for maybe a playoff berth this year, becoming mediocre this year does not change my perception that to really compete for a ship, hard choices need to be made.

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Absolutely. Missing is in no way alleviated because we we accumulated more points in half 2 than half 1. It’s not relevant 

Edited March 21, 2024 by Thorny

[Thorner]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:44 PM, bob_sauve28 said:

Hopefully next year, we have two solid goalies

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Huge thing to look for 

[...]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:46 PM, Brawndo said:

Granato looked at VO’s Game against Vancouver and sits Robinson. Gotcha 

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  On 3/21/2024 at 5:51 PM, Brawndo said:

 

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[Thorner]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:46 PM, Brawndo said:

Granato looked at VO’s Game against Vancouver and sits Robinson. Gotcha 

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Funny thing about Granato is ardent defences can be made in his favour to explain away the multitude of issues with the team from being his responsibility (which gets dicey because of the sheer quantity) but what can’t imo be convincingly done is a cohesive argument for how he’s done a GOOD job. The entire argument and defence rests on attempting to explain away the bad. Once we get past “good for development”, he really doesn’t have anything in his favour that we can say he’s adding to the team right now 

Edited March 21, 2024 by Thorny

[#freejame]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:46 PM, Brawndo said:

Granato looked at VO’s Game against Vancouver and sits Robinson. Gotcha 

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I look at that and see an entire lineup at forward that could all be shifted down a line, with a missing top line entirely. Others see it and think replacing the fourth line will get the job done. Crazy how that is. Leads me to believe we’re going to be disappointed again next year. 

Edited March 21, 2024 by #freejame
It didn’t make any sense before

[#freejame]

  On 3/21/2024 at 6:15 PM, Thorny said:

Funny thing about Granato is ardent defences can be made in his defence to explain away the multitude of issues with the team from being his responsibility (which gets dicey because of the sheer quantity) but what can’t imo he convincingly done is a cohesive argument for how he’s done a GOOD job. The entire argument and defence rests on attempting to explain away the bad. Once we get past “good for development”, he really doesn’t have anything in his favour that we can say he’s adding to the team right now 

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I don’t think he’s good at development. I think already skilled teenagers thought he was a good coach and that gained him a reputation as a development guy because those players went on to success. 

[Thorner]

  On 3/21/2024 at 6:15 PM, #freejame said:

I look at the and see and entire lineup at forward that all be shifted down a line, with a missing top line entirely. Others see it and think replacing the fourth line will get the job done. Crazy how that is. Leads me to believe we’re going to be disappointed again next year. 

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It was always risky to bet on “Tage Thompson” to be a true 1C. Jury is out. (Same with Tuch. Skinner was always a ticking time bomb.)

Best thing is a 2C is fine by contract. It doesn’t fix the issue, but it allows for it to be fixed with proactiveness

Say what you want about Adams, but one thing is we know he’s very proactive and aggressive 

Right 

Edited March 21, 2024 by Thorny

[MattPie]

  On 3/21/2024 at 11:19 AM, CallawaySabres said:

Losing is not an option tonight. We obviously did not stand a chance against Vancouver so that was the 1 loss we could afford on this road-trip for the rest of the season. They put themselves into this position so now it is up to them to get out of it.

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FTFY.

[Thorner]

  On 6/2/2023 at 9:47 PM, Thorny said:

And yes, adding Hellebuyck WOULD be to make a Cup run. This is the reality of our window as it stands. It’s go time. It’s not selling the farm. It’s not close. It’s using a small portion of draft capital as currency because we can, and our top line is in its prime and we scored along with the best teams in the league last year and have a Norris level D man. We can try to go on a run now.
 

It’s not THAT scary to have expectations, I promise. don’t be afraid. 

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  On 11/18/2023 at 8:26 PM, Thorny said:

Our first line would also be past it’s prime 

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To your point below, this is something I’ve mentioned a lot, many had been acting like we could just wait around for our prospects to develop after our top line arrived last year: it was just never likely to be the case. People were pencilling forward career years without any sort of age drop off years into the future. You have to maximize those things WHILE you have them 

  On 3/21/2024 at 6:15 PM, #freejame said:

I look at that and see an entire lineup at forward that could all be shifted down a line, with a missing top line entirely. Others see it and think replacing the fourth line will get the job done. Crazy how that is. Leads me to believe we’re going to be disappointed again next year. 

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[K-9]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:51 PM, Brawndo said:

 

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Matt Ellis up all night burning the midnight oil. This oughta do it!

[Thorner]

  On 3/21/2024 at 6:29 PM, K-9 said:

Matt Ellis up all night burning the midnight oil. This oughta do it!

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[PerreaultForever]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:51 PM, Brawndo said:

 

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So they sort of realized that Dahlin Byram PP configuration wasn't working. It was nonsensical and confused. Still have that 3 quarterbacks and 2 units thing to work with though. Benson is your net front? Okay, put the little 18 year old in front why not. He does go there, but this makes no sense to me at all. It's almost like they want 2 equal units rather than 1 good unit but whatever. No matter who goes where the same basic dynamics apply and if we don't get in front and don't screen and tip we won't get the results either. 

I actually think they can win this game though. Not that they necessarily will, but it's a bit like Toronto. Edmonton likes to play wide open too so if we get them into that type of game it can come down to goaltending as the only difference. So we have a solid chance. 

 

[Weave]

  On 3/21/2024 at 6:40 PM, PerreaultForever said:

So they sort of realized that Dahlin Byram PP configuration wasn't working. It was nonsensical and confused. Still have that 3 quarterbacks and 2 units thing to work with though. Benson is your net front? Okay, put the little 18 year old in front why not. He does go there, but this makes no sense to me at all. It's almost like they want 2 equal units rather than 1 good unit but whatever. No matter who goes where the same basic dynamics apply and if we don't get in front and don't screen and tip we won't get the results either. 

I actually think they can win this game though. Not that they necessarily will, but it's a bit like Toronto. Edmonton likes to play wide open too so if we get them into that type of game it can come down to goaltending as the only difference. So we have a solid chance. 

 

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Regarding your last paragraph….

Its not the same Edmonton.  Their game is closer to Colorado these days.

[Thorner]

Of course the odds are already long but we probably cannot afford to lose tonight: one of NY Islanders or Detroit WILL win as they are playing each other, so combined with Caps having 3 in hand, it’s just not gonna happen.

On the other hand, a win does keep things alive: best case scenario Detroit loses, and we are in essence 5 back, 4 back, and 4 back

Caps 2 points up w/3 games in hand (~5 points)

Detroit 3 points up w/1 game in hand (~4 points)

Islanders 2 points up w/2 games in hand (~4 points) 

Edited March 21, 2024 by Thorny

[DarthEbriate]

  On 3/21/2024 at 5:46 PM, Brawndo said:

Granato looked at VO’s Game against Vancouver and sits Robinson. Gotcha 

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Yup (and I want Rousek in the lineup if he's going to be called up). Something in the water doesn't compute.

But neither does the rest of the layout of the bottom 6. Those are two haphazard lines. At least have one you'd start in the D-zone and one you'd roll over the boards to attack. Like Skinner-Jost-VO; Rousek-Krebs-Girgs.   Now watch as each DG line gels, dominates, and outscore McDavid's line.

[DarthEbriate]

  On 3/21/2024 at 6:48 PM, Weave said:

Regarding your last paragraph….

Its not the same Edmonton.  Their game is closer to Colorado these days.

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Yup. Edmonton has given up the 6th fewest goals in the entire league. They're not run and gun and no goalie this season.

 

They also at one point were 5-12-1, making them...  36-9-3 since about US Thanksgiving (the dreaded "don't make the playoffs" line).