Saturday, October 6, 2007

Game recap: Isles 6, Sabres 4

Ten goals are not exactly a coach's delight, but there was plenty to like about tonight's season opener in Buffalo, not the least of which was the two points on the road.

What more could you have asked for from the new-guy line? (There has to be a better name than that - we'll work on it.) Two goals and two assists from Comrie, a goal and two assists from Fedotenko and three assists by Guerin -- these guys were a rash on the scoresheet. Toss in a goal by Vasicek (off a nice cross by Gervais) and the additions wasted no time making their mark.

Goal of the night? While Comrie had a terrific individual effort on his breakaway goal in the second to make it 5-4, you had to love the tic-tac-toe passing and Campoli's anticipation on the power play goal that gave the Isles a 3-2 lead in the first; Guerin to Fedotenko in the corner, then the one-touch pass to Campoli sneaking in? You couldn't have drawn that up better on Sega NHL '94.

DiPietro played very well despite the four goals allowed and made 22 saves. He flat-out never saw the first one and the Isles had a couple of bad defensive lapses, which the coaches will surely remind them of. But DiPietro's fine save seven minutes into the third led to a 3-on-2 that ended with Hunter shoving the puck past Miller in the goalmouth, which we hope we'll see a lot of this season.

All in all not a bad start. Still getting used to the new unis, but they grew on me as the night went on. I'm not a fan of the string ties or the orange sleeves. I think I'll end up getting a blue jersey at some point. But then again, fashion was never my thing.

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