Final score: Boston 3, Buffalo 2 in a shootout.

This one hurt. The Buffalo Sabres blew an excellent opportunity to stake their claim in the playoff hunt, which they would have done by beating the Boston Bruins in regulation. By blowing a 2-0 lead and then losing in the shootout, the Sabres failed to force an 8th place tie with the Bruins for the final playoff spot, and fell three points behind Boston in the chase.

“We didn’t deserve a point. Ryan (Miller) got us a point. I think we all realize that” fumed Lindy Ruff after the game, where he called out the entire team for their lackadaisical effort. “Third period? We didn’t play well in with the third or first periods” said Ruff. He specifically mentioned the lack of capitalizing on scoring chances, and in particular described Boston’s tying goal late in the third. “We turned a 3 on 2 into a 2 on 1 and almost a breakaway…. We have to find out why, find out why our energy level was so low.”

Both teams got off to a pretty sluggish start, with choppy play and few scoring chances on either side early on, although the Bruins seemed to carry most of the play as the period went on.

Buffalo got on the board in the closing seconds of the first period, a nifty one timer from Jaroslav Spacek on the power play. The team would add to its lead in the second, with Thomas Vanek getting his 16th goal of the season, stuffing in his own rebound on the doorstep through Bruins goaltender Alex Auld.

Things got interesting in the 3rd period when the Bruins cut the lead to 2-1. Around the 15 minute mark of the game, Defenseman Brian Campbell leveled P.J. Axelsson with a huge open ice hit at the Boston blue line, and Glen Murray’s retaliatory hit drew a penalty, but Buffalo could not convert or get a decent scoring chance. Describing the hit, Campbell said “It was a hit, just a play in the game. I’m just trying to hit guys when I can, it’s not like I’m trying to hurt him or anything.”

The Bruins would tie it at the 16:10 mark with Marco Sturm putting on the burners and beating Ryan Miller over the shoulder. Buffalo did not register a shot on goal until with just under 3 minutes to go, and were outshot 17-1 for the period. At the end of regulation, the boos cascaded from the rafters from the fans who saw this golden chance for a regulation win slip away. Derek Roy was pretty blase about the whole thing: “Well, we passed on a couple opportunities to put the puck on net, we weren’t skating very well, the ice was pretty rough out there and didn’t get the bounces.”

The five minute overtime generated few scoring chances by either side, and the game went to a shootout.

Two nights ago the Sabres dazzled the fans with an electrifying shootout win, but tonight Alex Auld would stonewall the Sabres with saves on Ales Kotalik, Henrik Tallinder and Derek Roy. Tallinder tried the deek but came up empty. Boston got one goal on a deek by Phil Kessel and that proved to be the game winner.

More bad news as Drew Stafford left the ice limping in the third period with an ankle injury, the same ankle that had him on the sidelines for a couple of games last month. There was no word as to how severe this injury is or if he will miss any time.

The Sabres have two days to wipe the stench of this one off of them, and will face the Florida Panthers at the H on Sunday at 6PM.

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