Sabres win clinches playoff berth for Devils

March 25, 2009   ·   Hasan   ·   Jump to comments

On a night the Devils didn’t play, they still clinched a playoff berth after Buffalo’s 5-3 win over Florida ensured a 12th straight postseason for New Jersey and kept the Sabres’ own playoff hopes on life support.  Normally a postseason berth would be barely worth a mention around these parts, and for this year’s team in particular bigger things are expected starting in mid-April.

It is funny how things have changed from mid-November when I was just concerned about staying in the playoff race by Martin Brodeur’s scheduled (and as it turned out accurately) return in late February.  The fact that this team has already accomplished so much this season has made a normally mundane 82-game marathon a fun roller coaster ride, with far more ups than downs.

There are still goals to be accomplished in these final nine games to be sure, first among them is locking up the division then perhaps the second seed.  Before even that however, this team does need to find a way to fix a penalty kill that over this last week has coughed up goals at an alarming rate that would send even Chris Osgood’s GAA skyrocketing.

Yet, after a grueling five game in seven day stretch and just before a six game in nine day gauntlet, this team does deserve a tip of the hat and some modest celebration.  Some of that celebration took place yesterday during the team’s annual awards luncheon.  As expected, Zach Parise won the team’s MVP award, clearly a well-deserved honor in a season where he could surpass both Brian Gionta’s team record for goals and Patrik Elias’s in points for a single season.  Currently Parise has 41 goals and 88 points, leaving him still a bit shy of Gionta’s 48-goal total of 2005-06 and Elias’s team high of 96 points in 2000-01 with nine games left.

Captain Jamie Langenbrunner won the ‘Player’s player’ award.  Admittedly I was worried he’d lost a step early this season but as it turned out, Langenbrunner’s already established career highs in goals (25) and points (63), and this is a fitting award in Jamie’s first full season as captain since technically he wasn’t named captain last year until coming off of IR in November.

For the unsung hero award, the Devils selected a player who wasn’t even in attendance or on the active roster.  Yet, there was nobody else that could have won this award but Scott Clemmensen.  To use a football expression, he held the fort (and then some) when Brodeur and others were hurt early in the season.  Unfortunately his 25 wins this season and great numbers may get lost in the shuffle in light of Brodeur’s spectacular record-setting comeback, not to mention the fact that Clemmensen’s back toiling in Lowell as if nothing had ever changed.  Certainly this award, and Clemmensen’s nomination for the Bill Masterton trophy over the weekend is much-deserved recognition for someone who did everything that was asked of him without complaint and did it well.