Sabres get Christmas present with victory over Avalanche
By Rick Anderson
Friday, December 24, 1999

The Sabres can now enjoy their Christmas. After beating the Colorado Avalanche 2-1 last night, the players can relax and savor the holiday spirit with their families. Had they lost, it would have been like the Christmas Grinch stealing all the fun.

Two of the happiest Sabres have to be Martin Biron and Geoff Sanderson. Sanderson finally scored his fist goal since before Halloween and Biron continues to sparkle in the nets.

Growing up in Quebec and being a Quebec Nordiques fan, Biron didn't consider Patrick Roy as his hero. Roy was the star goalie of the arch rival Montreal Canadians and Biron considered Roy as the Nordiques nemesis.

Martin Biron watches play behind the net while Colorado's Jeff Odgers and Brian Holzinger get their sticks up in the crease

"I was a Nordiques fan, so I always kind of hated him," Biron said about Patrick Roy. "I had favorite players and a favorite team, and I always backed the Nordiques. But I always took him as a role model. He played Triple A midget when he was 16, I played Triple A midget when I was 16. I modeled his path to the NHL a little bit."

"I never really met the guy. I've never talked to him," Biron said. "He lives 10 minutes away from my house back around Quebec City. I saw him last year at a gas station, I was across the street."

Both goalies faced 23 shots in the game, Biron just made one more save than his arch villain. Replacing one of the greatest goalies ever to tend the nets hasn't been easy for the Sabres 22 year old rookie. Going head-to-head against another goaltender just as great as Dominik Hasek or even better was a real test. Roy was a role model for him and this was his first chance to showcase what he learned from the master.

"These are goalies I grew up watching. I model myself after a lot of French goalies like Roy," Biron talked about the future Hall of Famer. "I grew up watching him and he is kind of a role model. If I can achieve half of what he has achieved it would be great."

"I was looking at the way he was playing, the way he was coming across - things I have seen on tape when I was in hockey school," Biron described Roy's play last night. "He still plays the way I learned how to play in hockey school.

"Playing against the Avalanche, they're a good team and that's a thrill to go against a team that I grew up idolizing, the Nordiques. So you look at it and say that's the team that I grew up watching."

The Sabres have reached that barrier again, you know the one that cannot be mentioned without jinxing them again. Their record is now 15-15-5 and the Sabres will try to break through that barrier for the first time when they face the New Jersey Devils on Monday in New Jersey.

"It's been a struggle, but we have played pretty solid," Ruff said about their current streak. "Defensively, we've played very good. Offensively - even tonight, I would have liked to see a couple more go in. Last (game) could have been a five or six goal game. Tonight, possibly we could have got three or four. But for the most part, chances tonight we are at least 2-1 and in New York they were 3-1. When you start tilting the scale in that direction, you're going to win your share of games."

The Sabres and Avalanche played to a scoreless tie in the first period. The second period continued to be a defensive struggle until 3/4 of the period was over. With almost 16 minutes gone by in the second period, Curtis Brown won the faceoff against Chris Drury. Michal Grosek skated along the back boards to Roy's right and quickly passed out in front to Miroslav Satan who skated in to the left of Roy. The puck hit Satan's stick and he immediately shot it from an almost impossible angle and it got past Roy on the far side. The goal came with only 2:56 left in the period.

"I didn't see what happened," explained Roy. "I didn't think he was a threat (to shoot), so I expected a different move."

"I was surprised that I scored," Satan said. "I went for the outer post thinking why not have a shot, and it went in."

Jason Woolley squeezes Peter Forsberg out of the play along the boards

With a little over a half a minute left in the period, Brown won another faceoff against Drury and Geoff Sanderson scored his first goal since October 29. The goal ended the longest Sanderson has ever gone in the NHL without scoring a goal, 19 games. Rhett Warrener took the shot and Sanderson was able to tip it past Roy.

"I saw it all the way," said Roy. "He just tipped that one in front of me in the last second. It was almost on me when he tipped it just over my glove." "That felt good," said Sanderson. "The odd-man rushes weren't there. I just sort of planted myself around the net, maybe get a rebound or a deflection like I did. It's exactly what I need, an ugly goal. It puts a jump in your step and helps me get some confidence back."

"It's been a tough stretch," a relieved Sanderson continued. "Goals have been hard to come by. All you can do is do your best and stay positive. Otherwise, you'll just bury yourself deeper."

Sanderson has been pressing since the last time he scored and could not buy a goal. Last year, Sanderson's goals seemed to come in streaks and he's hoping he can now light the goal lamp more often.

"Now we can sit back for the next couple of days, enjoy life, enjoy our families, and then come back with a fresh mind and a fresh body," said the ‘Sandman.' "And I'll be starting on a streak. It's not one goal in 20 games for me, it's one in one."

The Avalanche came out gunning in the third period and made it a game when Adam Deadmarsh scooped up a loose puck following a scrum around the right faceoff circle and fired a wrist shot that flew over Biron's right shoulder and in behind him. The goal came at the 8:23 mark of the period.

Describing that goal, Biron said, "In these kind of situations, I should have made myself look as big as possible, come out and play the scrum. I think I played reverse - I looked as small as I could out there. He shot it over my shoulder and it went in."

Ruff challenged the goal, claiming that a hand-pass was made. The referees paid little heed to Ruff's arguments and later on Lindy changed his mind.

"I guess I was wrong again," Ruff admitted about his challenge of Deadmarsh's goal was a result of a hand-pass. "0-for-2 now. The replay looked like a hand-pass. I apologized again. Good try though, wasn't it?"

The Sabres defense stiffened the rest of the way and Biron had his 13th victory. Biron now stands with a 13-7-1 record with a GAA of 2.17 and a save percentage of .915. The past two games he went into the third period looking for his third shutout of the year, but came up short.

"Tonight was a great game, a solid effort," the Sabres prime candidate for the Calder Trophy said. "We didn't give them too much. They're a big-scoring team, but we worked harder to compensate for that."

Lindy Ruff was happy with the Sabres play this past week. Now he too can relax and enjoy Christmas with his family.

"That's two strong games in a row," Ruff said. "We knew we were going to have to play a smart game tonight. We knew they had two very strong lines that we couldn't give a lot of chances to. We ground the game out. It wasn't an easy game to play. Gotta give the guys some credit, they played one of their best defensive efforts along with creating some pretty good offense too."

Geoff Sanderson said that the team is taking the attitude that they aren't going to get too many two-on-ones, they aren't going to get those dazzling goals - they have to get the ugly ones. Ruff replied to that statement saying, "Geoff missed the game in New York, because we had breakaways, two-on-ones, we had everything. We just haven't capitalized on them. We are still going to get those opportunities. Right now we haven't been taking advantage of them and that has a little to do with confidence, making the right play.

"They're a good hockey team. They've got some real good speed in their top two lines. We weren't going to trade opportunities with them. We thought we'll take our chances when they come, we'll forecheck when we can. But we weren't going to do a lot of pinching, especially on the strong side because they've got some guys you're not going to catch. I thought our guys didn't give up the odd numbered situations and frustrated them for the most part for two periods. In the third (period), they poured it on and created some (opportunities) by just having five guys attack."

"That wasn't an easy game for Martin to play," Ruff said about the kid who is starting to make some forget about Hasek. "For a young goaltender, there wasn't a lot of action. That's a game he's really got to work on the mental side of it and stay sharp, and when that one great opportunity comes he's got to make the save. He's shown some real good composure when it comes to that. I thought he played the puck a little bit like Dom tonight, but other than that he was pretty good."

In the last six games, Biron has allowed only seven goals. The Sabres are who are 4-1-1 in that stretch.

When asked how he stayed awake the first two periods, Biron said, "I tried to just by looking at what was happening on the ice. It's the kind of game you have to really focus. We've had a lot of games like that so far this season and we just have to try to stay focused.."

"You can never say that facing only a small number of shots is good," Biron continued. "Sometimes pucks find a way to go in. That's where experience comes in. You have to prevent that puck from going in. You could see how Patrick was getting out of the net and playing the puck a lot because he wanted to keep himself in the game, and it was a little bit like that for me. I was trying to get myself focused."

Asked if he were beginning to think about getting a shutout against the Avalanche, Biron said, "Not really. The same situation happened in New York. You don't go out there thinking shutout. It's a 2-0 game, you have to make the next save. It doesn't matter if you've got 12 shots or 42 shots (against) in two periods, you have to make the next save. I think I got lucky one time when we were on the power play. I think they made a 2-on-1 pass, the guy shot it - it dribbled through my legs and I gave it a little kick with my heel, it got out of the crease the other way. That kind of tells me like ‘Next time you've got to be more ready,' because it's a 2-1 game and you've got to make the save when it counts."

The Sabres better take full advantage of their three days off for they get right back into action against two of the best teams in the league when they play back-to-back games against the Devils and the Red Wings. That will close out their schedule for this century and Buffalo will open the new millennium with their Y2K game against the Toronto Maple Leafs on January 1 - that is if Marine Midland Arena isn't in complete darkness!

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