Sabres Finish Pre-Season Strong

The Sabres finished the NHL Pre-season proving two things. One, they can still score even without Briere and Drury and two, Derek Roy appears ready to step in and fill the #1 center shoes for this team.

The Sabres opened the final week of the Pre-season by beating up the Maple Leafs 7-2 in Toronto. The Line of Drew Stafford, Roy and Thomas Vanek totally dominated the Leafs and Roy recorded 6 points. The Sabres followed that impressive victory with equally an equally impressive sweep of a home and home series with the Pittsburgh Penguins. In game one Roy continued his impressive play and led the Sabres to a 6-5 victory. In the final game the Sabres, led by Connolly and Roy, rallied to a 4-3 victory.

News and Notes

- Derek Roy led the NHL in Pre-season scoring and it appears that he will center a line with Drew Stafford and Thomas Vanek to start the season.

- with Teppo Numminen out at least 3 months with heart troubles I expect Mark Mancari to fill the role of 13th foward/ 7th defenseman for short term injuries. if a defenseman goes out longer expect to see Andrei Sekera called up.

- The most interesting training camp battle appears to be a four-way battle for playing time among Clark Macarthur, Mike Ryan, Mark Mancari and Marek Zagrapan. all three were very good in preseason with Zagrapan appearing to be the best. That being said I expect MacArthur and Mancari to start in Buffalo with Zagrapan coming up quickly if either falters. Though I think the Sabres like Ryan, I think he gets lost in a numbers game. he will be on an NHL roster somewhere this season though.

- Jocelyn Thibault, the Sabres only free agent acquisition in the off-season has not looked sharp int he preseason. It will be interesting if it is just an adjustment period or if Thibault has lost a bit.

- It appears Jochen Hecht will recieve the kiss of death..er Sabres captaincy to start the season. This means he has approximately one-two years remaining in his Sabres career. Seriously, though, I would prefer that the team name Paul Gaustad as the captain, but Ruff has a good track record of finding the right guys.

- It appears the Sabres will be fully healthy going into the start of the season.

Sabres Lose to Wild 2-1 in North Dakota

The Sabres dropped a 2-1 decision in Grand Forks, ND, Monday, in a pre-season tilt with the Minnesota Wild. Phillipe Gogulla scored the Sabres only goal, set up by Marek Zagrapan. Jocelyn Thibault (above) started and played the whole way making 20 saves. He was the games third star.

The game was a homecoming, of sorts, for Paul Gaustad, who grew up in the area and Drew Stafford who played at the University of North Dakota. According to Jim Lorentz Gaustad had 65 tickets for the game.

On Sunday the Sabres and Blue Jackets finished off the back-to-back fight fest with the Sabres scoring a 3-2 shoot out victory. The game highlighted bouts in the first period between Sabres enforcer Andrew Peters and Jackets tough guys Tommy Sestito and Jody Shelley in seperate bouts. Al Kotalik and Jason Pominville scored the goals for Buffalo and Ryan Miller went the whole way in net.

In the shootout Miller shut the Jackets down and Max Afinigenov and Kotalik both scored on their opportunities for Buffalo.

News and Notes:

36 players remain in camp

No major injuries to report.

The team returned five players to their junior clubs:
Benjamin Breault (Baie-Comeau, QMJHL)
Jean-Simon Allard (St. John’s, QMJHL)
Paul Byron (Gatineau, QMJHL)
Drew Schiestel (Niagara, OHL)
T.J. Brennan (St. John’s, QMJHL)

Jocelyn Thibault looks to revive dead career...

A few weeks ago, while the Penguins were riding high on a somewhat unbeatable streak and rose from "scrub" to "contender", goaltender Jocelyn Thibault publicly admited he would like more playing time behind former first overall pick, Marc-Andre Fleury.

After a terrific month of January in which Fleury showed why he was a first overall pick, he went 7-1 with a 2.05 GAA and a .932 SPCT% to go along with 2 shutouts in that span, Fleury's play has gone from outstanding to mediocre.

Despite posting a 7-2 win-loss record in the month of February, Fleury's save percentage was a paltry .888 and his GAA floated around 3.22 during that month and he only managed to win games due to the emergence of Pittsburgh's offence, centered mainly around Sidney Crosby.

Most fans brushed this month off, claiming fatigue to be a factor as Fleury played in 10 games while Thibault only 3. His bad streak has not left him yet and he is still posting mediocre numbers in this month of March with nearly the same as the previous month with a 3.17 GAA and a .889 SPCT%, a miniscule improvement.

Despite his wins, head coach Michel Therrien did not leave these struggles go unnoticed by reacting with Jocelyn Thibault getting the nod against two powerhouses: the Ottawa Senators last week and the New Jersey Devils yesterday.
He has not dissapointed and that can be proven by looking at the final score of yesterday's Devils-Penguins game: 3-0 Pittsburgh...his first shutout of the season.

Although this is kind of premature: Thibault's numbers for the current month of play are impressive, maybe surprising considering he's fallen to a no. 2 goalie status.

3 GP, 2 W, 1 L , 1.46 GAA, .932 SCPT%, 1 SO
Before All-Star: 1-5, 3.42 GAA, .895 SPCT%
After All-Star: 5-2, 1.94 GAA, .929 SPCT%

This is Thibault's chance...with Fleury floundering he brings a lot to the table that the young netminder doesn't: experience.

He better not screw this up...