Top 5 of the Decade: Worst Losses
Tuesday, December 15th, 2009 11:47 pm by mrenninger
With the decade of the double-zero’s about to come to a close there are plenty of lists floating around debating the best or worst of whatever of the past ten years, and I feel that lists pertaining to the Sabres are far more relevant than anything People or Newsweek would throw out there. So between now and the dawn of 2010, I intend to put out a series of articles detailing the best and worst games, players, acquisitions from 2000 to the present. Why top 5 and not top 10, you ask? Well first, it takes less time, and second, I felt like paying tribute to one of my favorite movies from the decade, 2000’s High Fidelity.
What came first? The Sabres or the misery?
One warning, some of these lists may cause strong feelings of disdain and melancholy, and this one is certainly one of them, which is why it will lead us off and give us plenty of time to forget. The criteria was based on pain and disappointment, not by score, and if you feel rightly depressed being brought back to these dark days, just remind yourself the Sabres are at the top of the Northeast Division coming off last night’s great win at Montreal. Even if that will provide little solace.
One of my favorite songs lyrically is “To Win Just Once” by an Irish band called The Saw Doctors, who produce a solid mix of traditional Irish music with modern rock. The first verse goes like this:
To win just once would be enough
For those who’ve lost in life and love
For those who’ve lost their guile and nerve
Their innocence, their drive and verve
For those who feel they’ve been mistreated
Discriminated, robbed or cheated
To claim one victory inspired
To win just once is their desire
Couldn’t have said it better myself, and without further adieu, the top 5 worst losses of the 2000’s, as ranked by yours truly:
NUMBER FIVE
Game Six, 2001 Eastern Conference Semifinals
May 8th, 2001
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh Penguins 3
Buffalo Sabres 2 (ot)
In spring and summer 2001 I wasn’t concerned with much else aside from getting to second base with my then-girlfriend, even if she did have a pronounced lisp, couldn’t drive and had zero interest in sports (ah the joys of being 16). However, one of the few things I did have time to focus on were the Sabres, who did not disappoint, grabbing the 5th seed and easily turning aside the Flyers, earning some retribution for the Phantom Goal fiasco the previous year (more on that later) and setting up a showdown with the 6th seeded Penguins, who were the darlings of hockey thanks to the most miraculous comeback in the history of comebacks (Pre-Tedy Bruschi anyways), by Mario Lemieux. The Pens took a 2-0 series lead, followed by the Sabres, very aware of the possibility of Hasek’s departure after that season, grabbing three straight to go into game 6 on the cusp of their 3rd conference final in four seasons.
It's easy to look great when the puck drops at your feet...
(In case you couldn’t tell, that statement about Lemieux was straight out of the hyperbole department. Personally, I think Tim Connolly making it through an 82 game season is more impressive than Lemieux’s Hodgkin’s comeback)
The Sabres took the lead into the 3rd thanks to a goal by recently reacquired Donald Audette and soon found themselves less than a minute and a half away from winning the series when Kovalev took a shot from the right point which flipped high in the air for what must have been a second but seemed like an hour. There was never much doubt where it would drop, on Lemieux’s stick right in front of Hasek, and the sports world had its storyline for the night, with miraculaous/devestating tying goal by the hall of famer. The pens would win it in overtime on a goal by Martin Straka but that is mostly an afterthought, as it was Lemieux’s goal that caused the real heartache through Sabres nation.
And the worst was still to come.
NUMBER FOUR
Game Two, 2000 Eastern Conference Quarterfinals
April 14, 2000
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia Flyers 2
Buffalo Sabres 1
Perhaps in the grand scheme of things this shouldn’t have been such a painful occurrence. The defending Eastern Conference champions had stumbled through the season on their way to an 8th seeding position and drew the Flyers for their trouble, a team sporting a full 20 points more than the Sabres in the regular season. But the Sabres had Dominik Hasek and after making the finals as a 7 seed anything was possible. Little did we know that included goals through the side of the net.
Gary Bettman must have erased all the phantom goal photos from the net, this is all I could locate
Nursing a 1-0 lead in the second period and on the penalty kill, the Sabres watched John Leclair fire a slap shot past Hasek, who immediately shook his head in disbelief, believing he had covered the side to his left. He was right. Several game minutes went by before anyone with influence viewed the ESPN feed which clearly showed the puck going through the side of the net. With Regier screaming on the phone with Colin Campbell, and the on-ice officials actually sewing the hole back together, the replay officials claimed that once the ensuing faceoff occurs a play can no longer be reviewed or overturned- despite the fact that the NHL rulebook in 2000 nothing about when a play can be reviewed. The Sabres went on to lose game 3 and well before dropping the series in five. It probably wouldn’t have been so painful had the national media not been so eager to put their cigarette out on our arms again.
It was another embarrassing replay blunder for the league, and an unthinkably cruel twist for the Sabres who were beaten in Game 6 of the Stanley Cup finals last year on Brett Hull’s disputed goal with his foot in the crease…It was that kind of night for Hasek, the most dominant goaltender in the sport who suddenly finds himself vulnerable even when he has the whole net covered. -Associated Press, 4/15/00
NUMBER THREE
Game Three, 2007 Eastern Conference Finals
May 14, 2007
Ottawa, Ontario
Ottawa Senators 1
Buffalo Sabres 0
Go through the entire Sabres schedule and results for the 06-07 President’s Trophy campaign. You know how many times the team got shutout? Once. I choose this game over the Alfredson game five days later because this was the night we really knew it was all over, going down 3-0 to our most hated rival in a year that promised so much. Looking back, was that season even THAT fun? We started 10-0, rode the top of everyone’s power rankings all year, collected the most points in the league, and for once it was what we were supposed to do. Every game we won was a relief, every game we lost was a train wreck. Even the miraculous way the Sabres staved off disaster in the previous round to the Rangers didn’t give us any exultation, simply apprehensiveness that this was a team with the wheels about to come off. Following blowing a two goal lead in game 2 (another first for the season), game three was the first one all season that the team really, desperately needed, and when it mattered most they came out with nothing. I remember sitting with friends watching this disaster, the sound of slurps from beers the only noise as we watched a season’s worth of expectations circle the drain.
Total shots for the offensive juggernaut Sabres: 15
NUMBER TWO
Game Seven, 2001 Eastern Conference Semifinals
May 10, 2001
Buffalo, New York
Pittsburgh Penguins 3
Buffalo Sabres 2 (ot)
If you’ve only become a Penguins hater recently, no hard feelings, you have plenty of reasons: the baby-blue jerseys, the Favre-like love ESPN showers on Sidney Crosby (especially the god-like praise for his “clutch” winner in the Ice Bowl, which was really nothing more than losing control of the puck), that co-worker or classmate who claims he’s from Pittsburgh even though you know he’s really from Grove City. I get it. But long before these admittedly more annoying Penguins, there was the 2001 playoff series. As touched on before, the Sabres had taken a 3-2 series lead which had dissipated at The Igloo and brought on Game 7 at the Arena. Most fans knew that Hasek would be gone following the season win or lose, off to sign a contract that the Sabres would be unable to match, so there was a very real feeling that 2001 could be the teams last chance to bring a cup to the city for years.
The game went back and forth, tied at zero after the first and tied at one after the second. Less than a minute into the 3rd period Steve Heinze gave Buffalo the lead but 9 minutes later Robert Lang scored to tie it, and for the third consecutive game of this series the teams headed to overtime.
"I never liked him much then, and I f---ing hate him now"
Darius Kasparaitis had scored all of 3 goals in the regular season for Pittsburgh, a number below the Adam Mair range and just above the Andrew Peters range. I remember thinking he looked like a rat, or an evil character from a Disney movie, but definitely not a scorer. Besides, the best goalie in the world was between the pipes so there really was no reason to worry. But that is the thing about playoff hockey- every shot, no matter how harmless appearing can end a season- just look at Alfredson’s goal less than 3 years ago. A simple wrist shot from the point by who I called “the ugliest man in hockey” completed the Sabres collapse, and Hasek’s career as a Sabre. Did Hasek lay on the ice in defeat? Did he break his goalie stick over the crossbar? No. He skated to the bench and was off the ice before many of his teammates, leaving a bitter taste in the mouth of Sabres fans everywhere.
NUMBER ONE
Game Seven, 2006 Eastern Conference Finals
June 1, 2006
Raleigh, North Carolina
Carolina Hurricanes 4
Buffalo Sabres 2
There couldn’t have been any doubt that this game was going to be number one, right? It was the surprise of 2005-2006, that a team that couldn’t make the playoffs before the lockout was suddenly beating nearly everyone under the sun. It was a team that made us remember how much we missed hockey during the season that was cancelled, and after vanquishing the Senators in five games- the only team we had trouble with all year- it seemed things were finally falling into place, especially after drawing the lowly Hurricanes instead of the Brodeur-led Devils in the conference finals.
The hatred for the team was palpable: we sold out the 3 games in just under 10 minutes, in Carolina you could walk up to the gate a half hour before puck drop and buy several seats (something a friend of mine actually did). In Buffalo the buzz was electric, in Carolina they complained on newspaper message boards that Sabres fans were taking the “family atmosphere” out of the game. It made one ask if there was a big Nascar race, a Toby Keith concert, or a Larry the Cable Guy special on all week, we just couldn’t get how this meant nothing to a region when it meant everything to us.
You probably know about the injuries. Numminen, Kalinin, Tallinder, and Connolly were all out for the closing game, and suddenly on the afternoon of the deciding game it was disclosed that leading shot blocker Jay McKee almost lost his leg to a staph infection. It was around this time you had to ask yourself if a larger force was just trying to keep us from a championship, sending in guys like Doug Janik, Jeff Jillson and Rory Fitzpatrick (who would soon earn the title “Shitzpatrick” from many fans). Then something crazy happened, we were leading after the second period, 2-1. Carolina would tie in less than two minutes into the 3rd period and from that point all there was was for the other shoe to drop.
Brian Cmpbell flipped the puck over the boards for a delay of game penalty, leading to the most surreal moment since Bret Hull’s disputed goal in 1999. From USA Today:
Is THIS the guy you want going into the biggest game of the year?
Ryan Miller stopped a shot from Cory Stillman, but couldn’t control the rebound. It slid outside the crease and glided underneath Buffalo defenseman Rory Fitzpatrick, who apparently didn’t see it…
All ya had to do was look down, Rory, and maybe, probably, we take on the Oilers in the Stanley Cup finals, a team rife with deficiencies that showed all season as they crawled to the 8 seed. For everything that had fallen into place over many months, it took only a few days for them to fall apart, culminating in a different rip-your-heart-out experience for a fan base that had thought they’d seen it all…
NEXT WEEK: TOP 5 ACQUISITIONS