Buffalo, N.Y. (WGR 550) – The Buffalo Sabres hung in there on Sunday against the Florida Panthers, but a horrid second period did them in.
Buffalo almost came all the way back from a 4-1 third period deficit, but some horrendous refereeing turned the tide, and they lost 5-3.
Kyle Okposo helped cap off a pretty good first period for the Sabres, tipping in his 18th goal of the season. The last time he had that many goals was his first year with the Sabres when he scored 19.
For the second-consecutive game at home against the Panthers, the roof fell in on Buffalo in the second period.
Florida got a power play at 10:17 of the period and didn’t score, but they stayed in the Buffalo zone the whole time. They never left the zone until the end of the period, and outscored the Sabres, 3-0. The Panthers also outshot Buffalo, 22-8.
If you take the second period in Florida's 6-1 win back on March 7, Buffalo got outscored by a combined 7-0 score, and outshot, 42-15.
In this game, the Sabres reacted in a totally different way.
They came out hitting, they came out hard, and put the Panthers on notice that this isn’t going to be the cakewalk that it was the last time.
Anthony Duclair scored just 57 seconds into the third to make it 4-1, but Buffalo kept pushing and got back into it.
The Sabres scored power play goals from Jeff Skinner and Tage Thompson just 1:54 apart, and were pushing to tie the game late.
Unfortunately, Thompson took a tripping penalty at 17:02, and then the refs called a ridiculous hooking penalty on Mattias Samuelsson at 18:04, giving Florida a 5-on-3 advantage. The Panthers scored moments later to put the game away.
This garage league called the NHL, stopped calling penalties in their games about three weeks ago, getting ready for the playoffs, where the rule book is pretty much ignored. There have been games around the league lately where no penalties are called, and in most games, the teams get one or two power plays and that’s it.
The Samuelsson penalty was borderline, and hasn’t been being called in any of the games lately. Players get used to the way games are being called, and Samuelsson knew that has been OK lately. Referees have also not been putting teams down 5-on-3.
I have seen a lot worse let go in the past three weeks, because the refs didn’t want to put the offending teams down two men. It’s a shame the refs decided they were going to decide the game with inconsistency. I want that penalty called every single time with all the other penalties they let go, but you can’t ignore the rule book for three weeks and then call that.
Sunday was not from a lack of effort. They simply lost to a better team.
It's the level of games like these that general manager Kevyn Adams has to get the Sabres to through trades and the development of their good young stable of prospects.
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***Photo: Michelina Michaelina (@MiMiV4862)
