Devils continue to be spooked at home

October 29, 2009   ·   Hasan   ·   Jump to comments

I admit I’ve never seen The Exorcist movie, only heard of it.  Right now I think I need one though, not only am I 0-4 this season going to Devils home games (since I did not attend the Carolina shutout) but I’m also 0-1 at Lowell Devils games.  Granted it isn’t hard to pick a loss to go to for a Lowell game since they’re like the AHL version of the Thrashers but still 0-5 for all Devils teams is pretty bad as the month of October winds down.  Or maybe the team itself needs some spiritual intervention as Halloween approaches.  Whatever the case, another uninspired, sloppy performance at home led to a 4-1 loss to the feisty Sabres that dropped the Devils to 6-4 overall with a terrible 1-4 record at home.

It’s not hard to pinpoint when things went downhill, basically it was just after Arlette’s final note of the National Anthem.  Admittedly I had a hint it wouldn’t be Martin Brodeur’s night when I noticed Brian Rolston beat him with an ordinary slapshot in warmups (it would be nice if Rolston hit the net more during games too).  Brodeur, of course is a perfectionist who even hates to give up goals in practice, and all through the first period it looked as if he was fighting the puck.  Not that there was much Brodeur could do on the first goal just 81 seconds in when Clarke MacArthur got position in front and scored off a rebound, giving the Sabres the early lead.  However, Brodeur gave up a real clunker six minutes in when Tim Kennedy spun around and threw a puck on net from near the faceoff circle that somehow eluded the Devils’ goaltender, doubling the Sabres’ lead and giving Kennedy his first-ever NHL goal.  Buffalo never looked back, flying around the ice all through the first period and outshooting the Devils 14-7.

Perhaps someone finally told the Devils the game started in the second period, for they started to right themselves in an otherwise middling twenty minutes, outshooting the Sabres and cutting their lead in half at 4:17 when Andy Greene scored a power play goal (no, that’s not a typo, we actually did score on the PSE&G Power Play).  Greene took a rebound from a Jamie Langenbrunner shot and beat Ryan Miller top shelf with a nice wrist shot.  Amazingly, this made the second consecutive game the Devils scored a power play goal.  Of course, the prosperity with the man advantage wouldn’t last for long. 

Now down 2-1 going into the third, the Devils kept pressing to get the tying goal but despite a cluster of chances in the final two periods where the Devils outshot Buffalo 25-13, Greene would be the only player to solve Miller on this night.  Paul Gaustad’s goal at 9:25 took a lot of the air out of the building, after he scored on the dreaded backdoor play (think: tying goal in Game 7 last year).  After Gaustad’s goal, the Devils got two back-to-back power play opportunities, with the chances on the first one being much better than the second.  If you don’t have a deep roster – and we don’t right now – having two power plays consecutively exposes your lack of depth scoringwise, since the top players can’t take every single shift. 

Ironically, the Devils’ best chance to make it a game again came shorthanded when after a two-on-one Rob Niedermayer corraled a rebound and had Miller beat but couldn’t get the puck high enough and the Devils’ last, best chance went by the boards.  To add insult to injury, the Devils were shorthanded because they were whistled for yet another too many men on the ice penalty – their fifth in just ten games this season.  Seconds after killing off that penalty, a Nicklas Bergfors high sticking call led to Jason Pominville’s power play goal through traffic in front with just 2:39 left, sealing the game at 4-1 and convincing most of the 14,000 plus in attendance to head for the exits. 

I tried to stay till the final buzzer, as is my wont – especially since it doesn’t make a difference to me when I walk out seeing as I had plenty of time (or so I thought) to catch the city bus and head back to Broad Street before the 10:08 train.  Seemingly just to annoy me further, for some reason there were about as many stoppages of play from that point till the end of the game as there are in a normal NBA game, starting with a late TV timeout and a couple of penalties – why the refs swallowed their whistles for almost fifty minutes then called every penalty known to man in the final ten is beyond me.  Finally came the coup de grace for me, a Lindy Ruff timeout with 32 seconds left.  Yes the Sabres were still up three with so little time left even the Islanders against the Canadian Olympic team couldn’t blow that lead, but hey they were down two men, gotta make sure you don’t give up a stat-padding goal!  That was the last straw for me and I started walking out then.  Of course, I didn’t miss much as the Devils again failed to capitalize on a two-man advantage. 

I like Ruff but sometimes he can be a micromanager Joe Girardi style, like the game a couple years back where the Sabres were kicking our butt and outshooting us like 25-4 at one point before we put together a couple of good shifts, and Ruff called timeout (with a 2-0 lead on the scoreboard, mind you).  Apparently we weren’t allowed to ever get a leg up on his great team.  Funny thing was, that game went to 3-0 and stayed there until the final minute when the Devils suddenly rose to life and scored two goals with Ruff having no timeout to calm his team down – but Claude Julien pulled a mullethead move and called one himself.

Whatever the case, the silly Ruff timeout wasn’t my last annoyance on the night.  I could have easily made it back to Broad Street with a 20-minute walk but decided against it because it was cold and starting to sprinkle rain again.  After waiting a few minutes for the bus, it turned out a ten-minute ride on a normal night took 25 minutes due to a detour that closed off part of Broad Street and jammed up traffic, nearly resulting in missing my 10:08 train.  That delay was too much for one outraged woman, who demanded to be let off the bus yelling at the bus driver and pounding on the window screaming “Police!” at the cop directing traffic outside.  It was alternately funny and eye-rolling at the same time.  I had to move away from her, but as someone said – that was more entertaining than the game.  I, of course pointed out that depended on whether you were a Sabres or Devils fan.  And for a final annoyance last night, after finishing this recap, it dissapeared mysteriously when I tried to save it. 

Oh well, hopefully things go better tonight in Boston.  Maybe we’ll even see Yann Danis’s first start of the season.  Of course I probably have as much chance of being in goal myself than I do of seeing Danis between the pipes.

BoNY Three Stars:

1. Ryan Miller (31/32 saves)
2. Jason Pominville (goal, assist, +1)
3. Andy Greene (PP goal)