Peca's performance goes for naught in Sabres loss to Rangers
By Rick Anderson
February 26, 2000
The New York Rangers came back from a two goal deficit and scored 5 straight goals to give the Sabres a 6-3 thumping Friday night. By doing so, the Rangers move 3 points up on the Sabres in the playoff race for the 8th and final playoff seed in the East.
"It was a gritty win," said former Sabres' GM and now Rangers' coach John Muckler. "We fought through it, worked hard, and found a way to win. It's nice to come here and win a four-point game."
Petr Nedved equaled Peca's hat trick in helping the Rangers post their first victory over the Sabres since December 13, 1996. Dominik Hasek, who has been the master of the Rangers since then, only made 23 saves on 28 shots. One that Hasek didn't face was an empty-netter by Petr Nedved with a little over a minute remaining in the contest.
The question is how the Sabres turned what looked like a sure victory into a bitter defeat? They had control of the game, their captain was at the top of his game and the fans were in a Friday night party mood. The answer is undisciplined play and the referees Dennis Larue and Don Van Massenhoven giving the Rangers the upper hand for most of the second period.
The Rangers definitely got the benefit of the doubt from the on ice officials in the second period. While New York got away with hooks, haul-downs and slashing, the Sabres were tagged with four penalties in that period. First, Maxim Afinogenov went off for hooking at the 2 minute mark of the second period.. The Sabres were able to kill that one off, but at the 7:40 mark, Richard Smehlik went off for a double minor high sticking penalty and the Rangers capitalized with their second power play of the night. They scored again on the second Smehlik penalty to tie the game.
The game started out on a bright note for the Sabres. Michal Grosek fed a pass to Peca who was unguarded right in front of Mike Ricter and he slammed a one-timer past the Rangers' goalie to put the Sabres on the board first. It was the captain's 14th of the season and it came at the 3:41 mark of the first period.
Theo Fleury also got his 14th of the season when he picked up a rebound of a Mike York shot and
Fleury was able to flip it up over Hasek to tie the game with only 11 seconds remaining in the first period.
A minute into the second period, Peca scored his second goal of the night when Grosek fed him again, this time on the left side of the net. Peca was able to get it up on Richter and the Sabres were set to roll, especially when Peca scored the natural hat trick, his first three goal night ever in the bigs. He picked up the puck behind Richter, and made a beeline towards the front of the net, where he quickly did a wrap-around and slipped it through Richter's pads to up the Sabres' lead to 3-1. The sellout crowd at Marine Midland Arena was rocking and anticipating a romp. They were right in that aspect, but it was the Rangers who would do the romping.
"You look at the outcome, there was a lot of game left," the Sabres' captain said about the flow of game at that point. "It wasn't over at that point. I wanted to continue to work hard and try to get more. I had my chances. I could have had eight or nine (scores). The way it turned out, we needed them."
York, who leads all NHL rookies as the top goal scorer, notched his 20th at the 7:06 mark of the second period when he scored while Smehlik was off for high sticking. The Rangers were still on the powerplay when Nedved scored just 1:56 later and the game suddenly was tied. The Sabres had dominated the Rangers in the first and at the start of the second, only to have needless penalties kill the momentum and destroy any chance the Sabres had of overtaking the Rangers in the standings (on this night anyway).
Things got even worse in the third period. Alexandre Daigle got a pass from John MacLean and Daigle got a shot over the left shoulder of Hasek at the 5:21 mark. That turned out to be the game winner.
Then it became the Petr Nedved show. He scored two unassisted goals on Hasek and the game was history. The loss puts a big strain on the Sabres' playoff chances as Montreal is only one point behind after winning seven straight.
"Nobody thought we would be able to score five," said an elated Nedved. "The most important thing is the two points. I'm happy that I got it, but there are more important stakes at this stage. We're going for the playoffs, and nobody cares if I score a hat trick."
Richter made his first start in three games after recovering from a strained knee. He made 22 saves and was solid in the nets. Meanwhile, the Rangers put the breaks on their 10-game winless streak against the Sabres and Hasek. It was Hasek's first loss this century and puts him 4-1-3 since returning from his 40-game groin injury.
The Sabres try to regroup and begin another run at the final playoff spot against Maple Leafs Saturday night in Toronto. A loss against the Leafs could really put the Sabres behind the eight ball.
"Every loss is a big loss at this point in the season," Lindy Ruff said. "Every win is a big win. How we respond (tonight) is what matters most.
"One of the big mistakes in the third period was the fourth goal -- a guy left in front of the net and there's not a lot you can do. There was a little mixup between Holzinger and Woolley ... you can give them both a little credit on that play."
"We really didn't start out that well. I guess we don't start very well and work through it like that," Muckler said. "The power play got us going.
"The next test is going to be in New York," Muckler added. "Dominik had a tough time. I didn't think Hasek was playing that. I don't know if he's a little bit sore, but he wasn't moving real well. We thought if we got a lot pucks on the net, we might have a good chance. You know it's not going to happen very often. We were very fortunate to catch him on one of those nights."
"I didn't play well," Hasek agreed with his former coach. "There's nothing good I can say about this game. This was probably the most important game of the season, and I'm very disappointed."
"We played very selfish," Hasek continued. "It started in the first period. They didn't play a good game. They gave us three goals. We were two goals ahead, we controlled the game. We played stupid, no system, selfish. I didn't play well. It was a very bad sign because it was the most important game of the season. I'm very disappointed."
Jason Woolley was upset that the team let their captain down after Peca had played probably his best game of the season.
"He went out there and gave us his "A' game, maybe the best game of his career and we didn't do anything with it," said a distraught Woolley. "To see him do that and not have us respond . . . That bothers me. I feel sorry for us, we lost the game, but most of all I'm sorry for him."
Peca was bothered by the lack of offensive punch during third period power plays.
"It's inexcusable to have only two shots on net in the third period in your own rink with two power plays," commented Peca. "It's not really a clear sign that everybody is willing to pay the price to win hockey games right now."
"Obviously it's a good accomplishment," Peca said about his first NHL hat trick . "But I've said since the beginning of the season when I wasn't scoring that it's all about winning hockey games.
"The bottom line is we have to be a lot better for 60 minutes in all areas of the game to come back and win tomorrow (in Toronto)."
WATCH VIDEO OF HASEK'S ACROBATIC KICK SAVE...
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With the Sabres up 3-1 early in the second period, it appeared as if the Sabres were in complete control of their game against the Rangers. Michael Peca was a demon on the ice, hitting with ferocity again and scoring his first hat trick in his NHL career. Being up 3-1, and with Dominik Hasek in goal, it appeared as if the Sabres were destined to run the Rangers out of town again. Hasek had owned the Rangers since 1996 and he was also unbeaten this year. However, things changed in a hurry and the law of averages evened out quickly when the Sabres got into penalty trouble after Peca's third goal.
Dominik Hasek clears the puck with his stick as Richard Smehlik tries to clear a Ranger from the crease
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