The Buffalo goalie speaks out following the Sabres 4-2 loss to Vancouver.
By Chris Ryndak / Sabres.com
BUFFALO, N.Y. — “It’s not even disappointing anymore, it’s starting to get … I’m starting to get angry,” Robin Lehner said after Buffalo’s 4-2 loss to Vancouver on home ice last night. “This is all talk. We’ve got to look ourselves in the mirror here. It’s disrespectful. I think it’s disrespectful when we have a game plan, we’re going through things – the last few days we’ve just been going through on how to play our second period.
“You know, Coach brought it up there, you know, coming up with a good game plan. We do the exact opposite. We don’t do what he said. That gets me angry; I think it gets a lot of guys angry. Disrespectful, I think, is the word.”
Lehner continued later, “We haven’t done anything in this League. [Captain Brian Gionta] won a Cup. With all respect to him, he’s done something in this League. The rest of us, we haven’t. End of story.
“We’ve got to stop thinking after we win a game we’re Chicago or Boston or [whoever] we think we are, I don’t know. But it’s time. It’s time to realize that we’re a grinding hockey team that’s got to follow the structure and start listening to our coach and start respecting this team and respecting our coach.”
And here’s Bylsma’s response to Lehner’s “disrespectful” remark
“It’s not disrespectful to me, it’s disrespectful to the game and the process,” Bylsma said. “We’re not a team that’s a championship team. We’re not a team that’s won anything yet. That’s where we’re trying to get … The way we played was disrespectful to that process, disrespectful to the game.”
Forward Kyle Okposo added, “We talked about having a good second period this morning. We watched some film and decided how we were going to play, and then forgot to do it. I mean, we’ve got to go out and execute.
“Good teams go out there and they execute the game plan and they do what they’re supposed to do and then everything else takes over, your naturally creativity, your skill takes over. We just didn’t do that tonight.”
The Sabres seemed to be in good shape early, scoring 4:58 into the game and looking like a team that was ready to build off a big victory on Saturday in Toronto. However, that wasn’t to be. Penalty trouble didn’t help the situation for Buffalo.
The Canucks went 1-for-6 on the power play, but they were on the man advantage for a total 11:52. Buffalo has just three power-play opportunities with two of them coming late in the third.