Sens Shown the Door
Not many people, least of all Your Humble Servant, thought it
would be that easy.
A sizeable chunk of people, including Your Humble Servant, would
only have been mildly surprised if the first round series with
the Ottawa Senators had worked out exactly the opposite way.
The Sabres slunk into the postseason having squandered numerous
opportunities to improve their playoff position. The two key
acquisitions in the month leading up to the trade deadline, Joey
Juneau and Stu Barnes, were either hurt or snakebitten. From
their lofty perch atop the Eastern Conference at Christmas time,
the team had freefallen past the dogged Bruins, saved from a
first round matchup with New Jersey only by a more freely falling
Penguins team.
The Senators, no great shakes themselves down the stretch, were
nonetheless the darlings of the East, a speedy, determined bunch
which gutted out 103 points in the standings on the strength of a
solid goaltending duo, a battalion of character forwards, an
emerging defense led by a Norris Trophy finalist in 2001, Wade
Redden, and the next elite center in the NHL pantheon of stars,
Alexei Yashin. Add a generous helping of still stinging from
their seventh game, overtime elimination at the hands of the
Sabres in 1997.
Dominik Hasek had a "small hernia." The stars and planets
weren't aligned. It looked like rain. My knee was acting up.
Nothing -- ok, maybe one small thing -- about the first period of
the first game of the series dissuaded any of the disbelievers.
Outshot 16-4, only Dominik Hasek and a timely early goal by
Michael Peca -- the Sabres would score the first goal of each
game, three times on their second shot of the game -- kept the
Sabres even with Ottawa at 1-1.
That "one small thing" was represented by a note I made to myself
during the first intermission. Regarding the Sens, I wrote:
"tentative."
Tentative? How about when they outshot the Sabres 17-6 in the
third? Still "tentative?"
Well, yes.
The speed of the Senators' forwards was evident in spurts in game
one, but there wasn't the kind of hustle that uses team speed to
its maximum efficiency -- and that wins playoff series.
Little if any traffic in front of Dominik Hasek. Failure to
dominate in the corners and the battles for loose pucks. Low
percentage shots, when hanging onto the puck a little bit longer
might have been more effective. No fire in the belly.
Alexei Yashin had eight shots on goal in the game, but I didn't
know that until I read it in a summary the next day.
Coach Jacques Martin didn't even appear to be making an effort to
use the last change to keep Yashin away from Michael Peca in game
one. (Conversely, it looked like he was bending over backwards
in game two.) This could be attributed to overconfidence in
Yashin or underconfidence in himself.
When the dust cleared, the Sabres had stolen game one and taken
away home ice from Ottawa.
Game two was a tighter affair, with the Sabres matching the
Senators shot for shot in periods one and three. The Sens' two
goals came in a 13 shot to 3 barrage in the second period.
Alexei Zhitnik and Richard Smehlik, who'd been Lindy Ruff's
favored pairing against the Yashin line in game one, gave way
most of the night to Jay McKee and Rhett Warrener. Ruff remarked
after the game that Martin had made his life miserable in game
two trying to get the on-ice matchups he wanted. Whether true or
not, the Sabres shut down the Senators five-on-five, as they had
in game one.
Joey Juneau, returning to the ice after recovering from a mild
concussion, scored an early goal and had secondary assists on the
other two. Miroslav Satan had two goals, including a gimme
tap-in in overtime off a Jason Woolley rebound. That goal ended
the second-longest game in Sabres history.
Yashin was again held pointless, and most certainly didn't have
eight shots on goal (he had three). Nelson Emerson, Shawn
McEachern and Daniel Alfredsson were the Senators' most effective
forwards, which is fine if you're winning, but when you're not,
your purported superstar is going to be in the cold glare of the
spotlight. In game three, Yashin blinked.
If the Sens had been "tentative" in mustering 41 shots in the
first game, they were positively besotted with ennui in game
three. Hasek mailed in the 3-0 shutout, allowing Yashin and his
team to beat themselves.
On the first goal of the game, by Dixon Ward, Yashin failed to
put his body on Peca behind the net, and when Peca fed Ward to
Damian Rhodes' right, Ward skated in front of Yashin, who
halfheartedly waved his stick at the puck as Ward beat Rhodes.
My Bantam league coach would have benched my ass.
Yashin would have a seat for extended periods of the game, but
not on the bench. Sabres fans were reacquainted with the Vaclav
Varada they grew to love in last year's Flyers series, as Varada
drove Yashin to two ill-timed penalties in the second period on
consecutive shifts.
Brian Holzinger, of all people, put two goals behind Rhodes in
the second period to seal the win. Satan took an Alexei Zhitnik
slap shot off his ankle in the second period and left the game,
joining Geoff Sanderson (bruised thumb/wrist) among the injured.
As expected, the Senators played their best game of the series in
game four, but were victimized by another early goal and fell
behind by two twice. (The Sabres' second goal in game three
marked the first two-goal lead by either team this season.)
Varada rode his game three irritant wave to offensive glory in
the clincher, feeding Erik Rasmussen for his first career playoff
goal, then potting two himself. Hasek made 40 saves, bringing to
light the fact that without desperation Ottawa simply couldn't
win, but with it, they still had to beat the world's best
goaltender more times than the Sabres beat the Tugnutt/Rhodes two
headed monster. Game and series over.
Yashin had been hearing it from the Canadian media for days by
game four, and had complained to the press about being singled
out: "we win as a team and lose as a team." Ken Fidlin of the
Toronto Sun had a scathing reply: "When contract negotiations
begin, is Yashin going to take Andreas Dackell and Shaun Van
Allen and all of the other Senators lesser-lights into Rod
Bryden's office and declare he wants to get paid the same as
everybody else? Fat chance."
While the Senators played with exponentially more desperation in
game four, the undercurrent wasn't "tentativeness," it was
"trying to do it all yourself-ness." Attempting to stickhandle
through three Sabres defenders at the blue line, like Igor
Kravchuk in the second period, that sort of thing.
Yashin found himself behind Alexei Zhitnik and alone on Hasek
with Andreas Dackell in the first period. As I've said numerous
times here, I won't for a moment try to second-guess split second
decisions made on the ice, but it sure seemed to me that Hasek
sprawled on the ice to commit to Yashin's shot a tad early, and a
feather pass to Dackell could have resulted in an easy tap-in.
Yashin shot. On a power play later in the period, Yashin took a
couple of low-percentage shots from bad angles rather than using
the ice and his more open teammates.
When Yashin took a borderline elbowing penalty on Zhitnik in the
third period, and Zhitnik scored the game- and series-winning
goal on the resulting power play, it punctuated a real bad week
for Yashin.
The Sabres and their fans will watch with keen interest the rest
of the New Jersey-Pittsburgh series.
Sweeping Up
Curtis Brown, Holzinger and Varada came into the series with
double-digit games' worth of goal scoring droughts and ended
them. Stu Barnes on the other hand is at 25 and counting.
Darryl Shannon played in game one with James Patrick a healthy
scratch, but the two switched places for the rest of the series.
Shannon joined the team's other alternate captain, Rob Ray, in
the press box. Jean-Luc Grand-Pierre was the other healthy
scratch for the whole series.
Satan told Danny Gare his ankle was improving and that he might
have been able to play in a game five. Barring setbacks, look
for the 40-goal scorer to play in game one of the second round.
A fourth line of Rasmussen, Wayne Primeau and Paul Kruse was
effective enough banging Senators around that it became the third
line of three used for the majority of the third period of game
four instead of Barnes' unit.
McKee's fantastic sliding block to break up a goalmouth pass in
the first period of game four encapsulated what was an
outstanding series for him and his partner Rhett Warrener.
