Recap on the Sabres/Leafs Opener

Hockey is back! It feels so good to say that. I love the feeling you get when the lights finally dim down after you've been sitting in the arena with a few thousand hockey fans waiting for the game to start. I love hearing the announcer announce the starting lineup (especially how he says RYAN MILLERRRRR). I love hearing the Canadian and American anthems (especially when they're sung by Doug Allen). I love hearing the announcer shout, "NOW LET'S PLAY SOME HOCKEY!" It's enough to get any hockey fan excited and preseason hockey is a nice reminder for fans that hockey is finally back. Here's a little recap of my game experience:

- I went to the game with my good friend from Cleveland who I hadn't seen in several months. She is also a huge Ryan Miller fan and I hadn't seen her since the beginning of the last season, so while we were sitting in our seats waiting for the game to start we talked about Ryan's Olympic performance and him winning the Vezina which was nice.

- I was hesitant to wear my Miller Team USA jersey because I knew I would be in the company of a bunch of Leafs fans who are both: a) Canadian and b) don't like Ryan Miller (the feeling is mutual, bitches!)... But I decided that I'm not going to let stupid Leafs fans get in the way of what I want to wear in MY arena and I'm proud of owning a Miller USA jersey, so I wore it with pride.

- With that said, no one gave me a hard time over the jersey and the Leafs fans that I experienced were mild mannered. I'm guessing that has to do with the fact that it was a preseason game, but when I was in Toronto last year for a preseason game, things were pretty hostile.

- I didn't really go to the red carpet festivities (I sort of sashayed by it on my way inside when I got there around 6), but between that and looking at pictures of it online, I gathered two thoughts regarding it:

1. Kevin Sundher is really hot.
2. It doesn't get much cuter than this:

Taken by Mark Mulville for The Buffalo News. Enlarge for maximum cuteness.

- Now onto the game itself... I was really pleased when I found out that Miller was going to be playing. There's not much left to say when it comes to giving him accolades about his goaltending, but it was nice to see him between the pipes again. I thought that Enroth looked real good so I'm looking forward to seeing him get some playing time up here this season.

- I really liked Kassian. I know he's been impressive in training camp so I was eager to see him out there, and I think most fans were excited and pleased with what they saw out of him. I'm assuming he'll be seeing a lot of playing time during preseason, so we'll have to keep an eye on him.

- I liked what I saw out of the Morrisonn-Myers pairing. I liked the physical play out of Morrisonn.

- The power play is still worrisome... I know it was only the first game of preseason, but things were just looking a tad too familiar for my liking when it came to the power play.

- But the PK was spot on, like it was last season. But we were playing a Leafs team full of prospects and rookies, so...

- I still can't get a good read on Gerbe. Is he going to crack the NHL anytime soon?

- Ennis is very exciting.

- Saw a few of the guys out after the game. Derek Roy is still a diva. Some things never change.

I had a great time and it was great to catch up with my friend. She's a huge Sabres fan too, so she's always excited when she can make it out to Buffalo for a game. I also like taking her out to show her the Buffalo night life which usually never disappoints. The highlight of my night was watching a really sloppy drunk girl completely eat it in the bathroom. It was pretty hilarious but her drunkenly lying on the dirty, wet bathroom floor was slowing down the line and we had all been waiting in it for a long time considering there were only TWO STALLS.

Oh by the way, how lame is it that the NHL Network is blacking out our preseason games? I was lucky that I was at the game last night, but apparently they blacked out the game that was aired at 11pm on a tape delay. Really, NHL? It's cool that the NHL Network is airing 5 out of our 6 preseason games, but they are really going to black out the local market? Come on... It's the end of September, we are fiending for hockey, specifically Buffalo Sabres hockey. FIENDING. If I'm going to have to search online for a crappy feed of the game on Monday to stream on my computer, all while knowing that the rest of the nation gets to watch the game in HD on their nice TVs, I'm going to be one pissed off broad.