Notebook: Red-hot Sabres equal record with 10th straight win
Certain things go with the territory, and for the Buffalo Sabres, having to explain why they have played so well that they've tied a league record to start a season naturally falls into that category.
It's just as not easy as the way the Sabres, who equaled Toronto's mark of 10 consecutive victories set in 1992-93 by beating the Islanders 3-0 on Long Island on Thursday night, are making things look on the ice.
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| Martin Biron is half of Buffalo's outstanding tandem in goal. (Getty Images) |
So does Buffalo's blazing team speed, of course, not to mention the goaltending tandem of Ryan Miller and Martin Biron that gives the Sabres a chance to win every game they play.
To some, the secret to the 10-0 start lies in Buffalo's ability to get production from the four lines it rolls. But no one is denying that having a quick and mobile defense that can move the puck isn't among the greatest assets a team can have in the new NHL. And clearly, the impact of Lindy Ruff, the league's senior statesman among coaches, and long-tenured GM Darcy Regeir can't be overlooked.
But Drury sees another, more existential reason why his team has been running roughshod over everyone through the first month of the season.
"We're still very, very hungry," said Drury, who is tied for the league lead with 10 goals.
Maybe that's to be expected for a team that nearly tasted the ultimate success last year, even in an era when keeping teams together has become increasingly difficult because of the salary cap.
After missing the playoffs before the lockout, the Sabres rebounded with a brilliant regular season when they tied for the Eastern Conference high with 52 victories. Buffalo had little trouble moving through the first two rounds of the playoffs against the Philadelphia Flyers and Ottawa Senators but had their magical run abruptly halted in Game 7 of the Eastern finals by Carolina, a finale many believe the Sabres would have won had their top four defensemen not been sitting out with injuries.
Drury said he and his teammates don't see it that way.
"I don't think anyone really thought we were that close," Drury said. "Maybe on paper, but the fourth game in the conference finals obviously is the hardest game to win, and the next four are even harder.
"We know we still have a lot of work to do."
Much of that work started over the summer when the Sabres had to figure out how to deal with a lineup that had 11 free agents. Buffalo ended up losing forwards Mike Grier and J.P. Dumont along with defenseman Jay McKee, replacing the latter by signing Jaroslav Spacek and divvying up the ice time of the wingers among rookies like Jiri Novotny and sophomore speedster Jason Pominville.
Overall, the team was forced to bump up its payroll by nearly 50 percent, but the results have been worth it. The Sabres got their engine rolling with a 5-1 record in the preseason and have remained electrifying in the games that count, not only collectively, but in individual performances by players like Drury, Maxim Afinogenov and Tomas Vanek, who are all among the leaders in the league's scoring race.
Still Drury said no Sabres are getting ahead of themselves
"There's always stuff to work on and improve on," he said. "We've come from behind a few games and had a lot of floppy periods here and there, so what happens at the end of the night, whether you're on a winning streak or not, there's always things to work on, and we're well aware of that.
"Our mindset is not to be satisfied with the previous game, I guess. The old saying, 'You're only as good as your last game,' our motto is, 'You're only as good as your next game.'"
Thursday night, that was one for the books.
Jiggy is up
Anaheim Ducks goalie Jean-Sebastien Giguere has never met Sparky Anderson, but he seems to have a pretty good understanding of what the former Detroit Tigers manager meant when he said he could win a pennant every time with 25 guys on the last year of their contracts.
Giguere, 29, in the last season of a lucrative deal that will pay him $3.99 million this season, is off to a very good start after turning in up-and-down efforts since winning the playoff MVP award in 2003. He has yet to lose in regulation, posting a 6-0-2 mark with a 1.81 goals-against average and a .940 save percentage after leading the high-flying Ducks to a win over Edmonton on Wednesday night.
Those numbers put him among the league leaders in each category and have earned him the bulk of playing time ahead of Ilya Bryzgalov, who is three years younger and several million dollars less expensive. Bryzgalov handled most of the starting duties in last year's playoffs and in the minds of many is destined to become the team's No. 1 before too long.
Giguere understands that and finds its motivating.
"Right now, I have the upper hand, but a month from now, he may have the upper hand," Giguere said. "I've been saying all along I don't compete against him, I compete against the puck, that's what my enemy is, I guess.
"But we get along well; we're teammates."
For now, anyway. Giguere said he will probably become a free agent after the season, so he needs a good one to land him another big pay day. Ideally, he said, it would come from Anaheim,
"I'm not sure what the future holds for me, but I love playing here and living here," Giguere said. "This team is going to be good for the next five to 10 years. We have so many young guys that are tremendous, very talented, and then we have (Scott) Niedermayer and (Chris) Pronger for the next four or five years.
"For a goalie, it would be crazy to not want to play here."
Rangers might become strangers
The New York Rangers are heading west for a road swing, but chances are they won't be coming back with all the same players they taking out there.
Coach Tom Renney has made it clear that he isn't happy with the way several of his charges have performed early in the season, and that was before New York's embarrassing effort in a home-ice loss to the Florida Panthers on Wednesday. Earlier he suggested that several players are close to losing their spots on the roster.
"That's fair, that's fair," Renney told the New York Daily News, noting that his changes could affect veteran players who have slowed down since last year.
"It's a business. We're here to win. We want the Stanley Cup."
World Series Blues for St. Louis
If the baseball teams from St. Louis and Detroit are in World Series action this Saturday, hockey teams will be forced to vie for fan attention by playing the same night.
That's the main reason the Blues considered moving the game they are hosting against the Red Wings up to an afternoon start or to the following day, a thought that didn't work for either club. Detroit plays in Dallas on Friday night and didn't want to be in action the following afternoon, while St. Louis realized it would give the Red Wings an extra day off and go head-to-head against the Rams if the game were switched to Sunday.
So the game will be played as scheduled, and the Blues will have to deal with the competition from another local sports team again. Four of the St. Louis' first five home games will have gone head-to-head against Cardinals playoff games.
"They're having a run of a lifetime," team president John Davidson told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. "Hopefully as we move along, we'll have our own run."
Icings
- If Sergei Samsonov had visions of proving the Boston Bruins made a mistake by trading him last season, he'll have to put them on hold. Signed as a free agent last summer by Montreal, Samsonov has struggled early in the season with the Canadiens and was demoted to the fourth line before his team's first visit to Beantown on Thursday.
- The International Ice Hockey Federation has released an interesting study that claims most Europeans drafted by NHL teams between 2000 and 2006 didn't make an impact either at the professional or minor-pro level. The study concluded that 62.5 per cent of the 621 players drafted in the six-year period were either marginal NHL players who were frequent "healthy scratches" or were non-impact players on minor-league teams.
- Dallas Stars president Jim Lites was a little frustrated with the small crowd that saw his team's win against Vancouver on Monday because it went up against the Cowboys game with the New York Giants. And he repeated his belief that the NHL should run its season from November to July to avoid conflicts with the NFL. "With so many teams in the United States battling football, anything we can do to limit those conflicts would be beneficial," Lites told the Dallas Morning News.
- The Colorado Avalanche, who sold out more than 400 consecutive games heading into this season, had empty seats for the third time in a row when they played host to the Washington Capitals on Wednesday. Losing to the lowly Eastern Conference team won't do much to reverse that trend either.
They said it
The reality is, it's not much fun at this level if you are not winning -- Phoenix Coyotes coach Wayne Gretzky on his second year behind the bench.
