The SBP Archives - Your less than frequent dose of SBP!

Most fans probably saw last night's same as entertaining fare and are eager to see what the rest of the series holds.

For myself, I want tightening up, less goals allowed and more attention to defence.

Last night's loss is probably one of Ottawa worst losses in their playoff history. Worst, not in the sense that they just lost a game. Worst in a sense that they had the opportunity to seize control, win the game, and their carelessness blew it. That smug grin on Brian Smolinski after scoring Ottawa's 6th goal was simple arrogrance, and forgetting they had the lead multiple times during the game and always allowed Buffalo to come back...perhaps this will be a wakeup call they need to better prepare for the rest of the series.

Some Senators decided this was the time to turn in their worst performance in the NHL. Andrej Meszaros, I'm talking to you. Bad pinches, lousy dump-ins, horrible back-checking and a costly bad penalty after playing a fantastic game 5 against Tampa; what exactly happened out there Andrej?

I can't blame Emery for the loss, but as John Toroterella said previously, "We need an occasional goddamn save." Or in this case, all he had to do was smother the puck in the final seconds and he couldn't even do that. 7 goals on 23 shots. Awful.

After Volchenkov's turnover in overtime, only the second time I've seen him do something like that (although the last time was game 2 vs Tampa Bay) and the final marker afterward, to say it was shocking is an understatement. It was like a bad dream, but unfortunately this was real life.

I said Sens in six and I'm still sticking by that. You can look at the game as not so much what Buffalo did but what Ottawa did to themselves. They did so many things they don't normally do, you can look at it that despite all that carnage yesterday, the opposition still required overtime to finish them off.

Game 2 will show what Ottawa is made of. No team has gone 16-0 to win the Cup, and losses will come. How they handle this deflating loss will show us exactly what the Senators are made of.