Line shift paying off for Sabres
Published: January 04, 2010, 11:28 pm
Story tools:
Share this story:
Buffalo Sabres coach Lindy Ruff was pretty desperate in the first intermission Dec. 26 against Ottawa. The Sabres had been outshot, 19-1, and Ruff blew up his lines. Back together went an old standby from previous seasons: Tim Connolly centering for Jochen Hecht and Jason Pominville.
Good move. Hecht has played his best hockey of the season and Connolly has been red-hot, including scoring the only goal on a beautiful Pominville pass in Sunday's 1-0 win at Montreal.
Connolly has a six-game point streak — the Sabres' longest of the season — with five goals and four assists in that span. Hecht has three goals and two assists the last five games. Pominville, who was benched for the third period of Friday's win over Atlanta, still has collected points in five of the last six games.
"We've had times in the past where we've had some chemistry and played really well," Connolly said. "We've also had some games in past years where we haven't. Right now we're just trying to keep it simple, work hard and talk as much as we can to each other, let each other know where we are out there, support each other. I think that talk really helps out."
"We're putting numbers up, so that's nice," Hecht said. "We had some good cycles and good shifts in the second period where we got some pressure going. We know each other from the past, and it's nice to be back with those two on a line again."
Connolly's hot streak has him tied with Thomas Vanek for the team lead in goals (11), and his 32 points have pushed him one ahead of Derek Roy for the club's top spot.
"He's skating better. He's battling," Pominville said of Connolly. "He's always been a good player offensively. I think the numbers were just a matter of time for him to come in. He's also shooting the puck a lot.
"He's shooting pucks, and things will happen that way. He's been getting bounces, too, so he's definitely a threat offensively. We all know that. It was just a matter of clicking and getting things going."
In Sunday's game, struggling Clarke MacArthur (minus-10 for the season and no goals the last 10 games) was dropped to the fourth line with Adam Mair and Matt Ellis while Paul Gaustad joined Roy and Drew Stafford. The one standby line in recent games has been Tim Kennedy centering for Vanek and Mike Grier.
Mair, the only forward yet to score this season, has been particularly noticeable in recent games and has given Buffalo a threat from the fourth line in the absence of Patrick Kaleta. The Sabres had one December streak where 12 goals were scored by 12 different players.
"That's the strength of our team. We think we have four lines that compete every night," Hecht said. "It doesn't have to be just the same two lines. Different nights, a different line comes up with a game-winning goal and it's good that we spread the wealth around."
The Sabres were off Monday. They could not get out of Montreal Sunday night after the game because their plane got stuck in the mud on a snowy airport runway before the team even boarded. The team returned to Buffalo Monday morning.
Tampa Bay comes to town Wednesday, and the Sabres then have back-to-back HSBC Arena dates on the weekend Friday against Toronto and Saturday against Colorado.
Ryan Miller's shutout Sunday in Montreal dropped his goals-against average to 2.02 and boosted his save percentage to .934, second in both categories to Boston's Tuukka Rask.
According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Miller's shutout was the fifth 1-0 victory of his career. Four have come on the road, including one Oct. 10 at Nashville. Dominik Hasek is the only other goaltender in Sabres history with four 1-0 road wins. Miller's lone 1-0 win at home was on Feb. 13, 2008 against Toronto.
Utility man Nathan Paetsch was placed on waivers Monday. Paetsch's only point in 10 games this season was a goal Dec. 21 at Toronto. He has been a healthy scratch in four of the last five games. Teams have until noon today to claim him.
Newsletters
Sign up now for daily and weekly newsletters from BuffaloNews.com and get quick links to the info you want delivered directly to your inbox.Reader comments
Log into MyBuffalo to post a comment
MyBuffalo is the new social network from Buffalo.com. Your MyBuffalo account lets you comment on and rate stories at buffalonews.com. You can also head over to mybuffalo.com to share your blog posts, stories, photos, and videos with the community. Join now or learn more.
Comments have been disabled.
Due to a high volume of submissions that violate The News’ guidelines, commenting is no longer available on this story. If you’d like to share your thoughts on this story, click here to get information on contributing to The News’ opinion pages.