A Buffalo Tale (and How Incredibly Hard it is to Win a Stanley Cup)
This is going to seem like a bizarre article to post on a blog devoted to our Penguins. But I’ve been thinking a lot about the Buffalo Sabres lately and one thought led to another.
After losing 13 games in a row (0-10-3) in mostly inglorious fashion, I was heartened to see the Sabres won their second-straight game last night, a 6-2 thrashing of the Blackhawks. I would guess the recent return from IR of team captain and stud defenseman Rasmus Dahlin has and will continue to greatly help their cause moving forward.
I stated in a recent article I would gladly swap rosters with the Sabres. They possess a ton of talented young players, many age 25 or under, but for whatever reasons struggle to turn the corner.
In some ways the Sabres and Penguins fortunes are linked. During the NHL’s epic 1967 expansion, Buffalo was supposed to get the franchise that wound up going to Pittsburgh, thanks in no small part to an 11th-hour intervention by Steelers owner Art Rooney, Sr.
Buffalo would have to wait four years before being granted an NHL franchise, entering the league in 1970-71 along with Vancouver.