Habs vs. Sabres

Hockey night in Buffalo

Here are a couple of posts, one before the game and one after, I made at www.hfboards.com, the hockey chat page where I go by the username Neil Young Fan.
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"Tonight: My first live Habs game in 15/16 years"

Hello everybody,

I don't post very often, but I catch Habs news here everyday. It's so good to see them finally dominating again.

My girlfriend and I are driving down to Buffalo tonight to see the game. This is a very big deal for me; the last time I saw a Canadiens game in person I was ten or eleven years old. I grew up in PEI, so NHL hockey was pretty far away. My dad and I took the train to Montreal in February of 1990 or 1991 and saw two games. In the first, the Habs routed Pittsburgh 11-1, which is obviously pretty strange as Pitts was a contender then. If I recall correctly Mario was injured and poor Frank Pieterangelo had absolutely no help. The second game was against the Blues, and the Habs won 6-5 in overtime. The two highlights I remember from this one are Brett Hull firing a slapper from inside the blueline that was so hard it had bounced off the rear cross bar and almost all the way back to his feet before anyone saw it (including Patrick Roy) and in overtime Russ Courtnall flying over the blueline on a 2 on 1 and one-timing a slapshot through Vincent Riendeau's legs for the win. It was a great trip---other notables include going up the tower at the Stade Olympique and sneaking glances at all the strip clubs and sex shops downtown.

All the games I've seen since then have been on tv. For the first two years of my undergrad in Fredericton the farm team was there, but I only attended a handful of games. This was the during the Habs' dark years of the late 90s, and I had other obsessions while in university like, umm, philosophy...yeah, philosophy, that's the ticket. The only notable player I remember from the time was Theodore. My buddies and I were all convinced it was pronounced Ho-say, like Jose Canseco. A friend of my then girlfriend knew him (she was a bit of a puckbunny) and insisted that it was Jo-say. We told her that's a French girl's name, like Josee Chouinard. I'm sure she's laughing at us somewhere. Anyway. Now that I've renewed my Habs obsession---it came back when they finally made the playoffs again after all those years---I'm kicking myself for not going to more of the Fredericton Canadiens games. They played at the Aiken Centre, which is right on campus and only a 2 minute walk from the residence I lived in. Tickets were cheap and easy to get and the worst seats were still fantastic.

But now the AHL has left the Maritimes...as have I. We moved up to Kitchener in August. The closest team is the Leafs, and we all know how tough it is to get tickets, especially when they're playing the Habs. So the best option is Buffalo...not the first opponent I'd pick if I could only see the Habs play one team, but what the hell, at long last I'm going to see my team play, goddamn it!

I'll let you know how it goes...
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"Neil Young's thoughts on last night's game"

Ok, so I'm not Neil Young, but as far as I know I'm the only one with his name in my username, so I will act as his official representative. Keep on rockin' in the free world.

Buffalo fans must hate us now. First of all, I think the first two periods got their hopes up---their team was up by a goal going into the third and the mighty new Canadiens looked nonchalant. Then they realized the Habs were just toying with them, as they took it up a notch, had the play all over them in third and sent them home disappointed. On top of that, their building was invaded by scores of Theodores, Koivus, Roys, Namelesses, a couple of threadbare Gaineys and Carbonneaus and even a D'Ippolitano, all of whom drowned out the sparse Birons, Satans and one Rasmussen. (My girlfriend, like so many hockey-ambivalent significant others before her, simply could not reconcile that someone was actually named after the devil, all pronunciation aside.) To the loud choruses of Go Habs Go and the Ole song the hometowners could only respond with halfhearted booing. And when the Habs festivities spilled over into the lobby and the street, I saw a lot of Buffalo fans with their heads down, making for their cars with the purposeful stride of the dejected. A throng of Buffalo fans at the Bell Centre tonight and a Buffalo road win would level the karma a bit, but let's hope things stay cosmically imbalanced in our favour. Somehow I can't picture the Bell Centre raucus with those, um, well-known Buffalo Sabres chants (Let's Go Buf-fa-lo! is so easily reworked to Let's Go Mon-tre-al!) but you never know.

Some other observations on the event (I took notes):
-the pretzels are saltier than the bloody Dead Sea. I think they must drag them through road salt coated in epoxy. My girlfriend used 14 packs of mustard to try to tone them down. I'm having tongue replacement surgery on Monday.
-the Sabres took the ice to Street Fightin' Man. I've read the complaints on the Canadiens warming up to Coldplay---some feel that this is a bit too, shall we say, "inspirational," and prefer something tougher. On the other hand, Metallica or AC/DC might be a tad too mulletastic. I might suggest The Stones as a happy medium. Start Me Up or Jumpin' Jack Flash would be appropriate. Hell, a Neil Young tune would be great---Harvest Moon, Pocahontas, After the Gold Rush...Piece of Crap if the team is ever on a losing skid and need their ire raised.
-during stoppages in play the resident twit with a microphone was constantly on the jumbotron, and he kept trying to poke fun at "French Canadian" things. Then he interviewed Gilbert Perreault, who was evidently a bit nervous speaking live in front of 18,000 people...and the guy ended the interview promising that Perreault would sing an Elvis song if the Sabres won. Dude was as unfunny as your typical plastic-haired weatherman.
-I was sitting next to a pair of grannies who clearly loved their Sabres...every time Buffalo got the puck it was "c'mon Max!" or "c'mon Henrich!" or "c'mon J.P!" I couldn't help myself from throwing my arms in the air when the Habs scored or chanting with the other out-of-town fans, and I was expecting a purse upside the head every time. But I managed to escape un-maced and un-purse-thumped.

My thoughts on the players:
Buffalo - They wore red and tried to score on the good guys.

Montreal -
Koivu: Plays hard, creates opportunities, keeps his stick on the ice. My girlfriend likes him because his name rhymes.

Zednik: Up till last night my girlfriend's favourite player because his name rhymes really nicely if you call him Dick. At some point last night he made a good play and she shouted "That's my Dick!" We got strange looks and there was a lot of explaining to do.

Kovalev: My goodness that guy can stickhandle. The Sabres defence were on their heels everytime he crossed the blueline with the puck. A few times in the third the puck slipped off his stick when he got a bit too fancy, but I definitely agree with those who think it would be smart to put him on the point for the powerplay. Dandenault, Bouillon, even Markov look like puck-rushing amateurs compared to him. He's my girlfriend's new favourite player because he's "sneaky" though she wishes his name rhymed better.

Ribeiro: Realized part way through the second period that I hadn't even noticed if he was playing or not.

Ryder: He's not fancy like Kovalev, but he knows the value of driving to the net. His goal was nice, and you could feel it coming the way the line was buzzing around the Sabres' zone that shift.

Dagenais: Man. I kind of feel bad for the guy. I think he gave it more than his usual token effort last night, but it's clear he just doesn't have the skills. He did manage to connect with two hits...though in the time it took him to collect himself after the first one the puck went out of the Sabres' zone and came back in, and he just couldn't get those big strides going fast enough to get out. He also let go a crafty, ever-so-threatening slapper from centre ice. The way he strides about and then turns after side-stepping opponents makes me think of a big, goofy pelican chasing a bunch of falcons. Or a semi trying to play tag with Mini Coopers. You can almost hear all eighteen wheels screeching every time he tries to make a turn.

Sundstrom: Scored a nice winning goal, but I pretty much didn't notice Mr. Supporting Cast the rest of the night. Someone must have, as he got the first star.

Bulis: Wow, did he ever get flattened. That hit will definitely be on Rock 'Em Sock 'Em 57, or whatever the series is up to now. I can hear Cherry's commentary now: "Brian Campbell, good Canadian kid, knocks some visor-wearin' Euro into tomorrow." I thought Bulis must have been concussed, as it took him awhile to get up, but then he came back with a good solo rush a few minutes later. I shouted "Go Bulis!" and my girlfriend thought his name was "Goboolis"...this quickly devolved into Gooboolus, Globulis, etc. But I thought he played well.

Begin: Not only is he a constant hustler, I think he's turned into a genuine offensive threat. Dude's got zoom.

Okay, this is getting long, and it's almost time for tonight's game, so I'll speed it up.

The Kid Line: Good hustle, though they didn't capitalize on some good chances (Plekanec's breakaway, Higgins on the doorstep). Nonetheless, the future is bright.

The Defense: Man, Souray is the size of a tree and sheds the puck as gently as falling leaves. Clear the zone, man. Rivet and Komisarek are solid. Bouillon may be short, but he knocked a guy on his *** along the boards. Markov clearly has the most skill, though he didn't wow me last night. I found Dandenault nondescript. I swear I saw Streit floating around in the warmup, but then they announced him as a scratch. I wonder why he dressed at all.

Danis: I guess he was solid, if not showstopping. On a few shots, though, to my eyes he looked a little slow to react.

All in all, a great time. The cautious, tense, yell-at-the-team-through-the-television part of me does fret that the Habs seem comfortable with doing just enough to win, though. But that part of me stayed home last night, as it was a night out for the joyous, beer-swilling, my-team-is-the-best-there-ever-was-because-I'm-watching-them-live part of me.

To make my weekend even better, Arsenal won this morning. Now if the Habs can even the all time series against the Sabres tonight (I read the other day that they are 88-86-something against Buffalo, and now of course it's 88-87-something) and my indoor soccer team can pull out a win tomorrow morning, I'll go to work happy in a 4-0 kind of way on Monday morning.