Sabres at Devils Tonight

The Sabres head to the wastelands of New Jersey tonight to take on the streaking Devils. It seems like just last week that the Islanders had a grip on first in the Atlantic Division, but that was before the Devils went on a five-game winning streak. Coming off a 5-1 win over a suddenly competitive Bruins squad, the Devils are playing with renewed purpose.

Naturally, the success of the Devils rests largely on the large shoulders of goaltender Martin Brodeur. Brodeur has started all but one of the Devils games this year (but not much talk of goalie burnout in New Jersey is happening around the league), and is among the league leaders in most categories. His 2.19 goals against average and his .919 save percentage are stellar, and he has four shutouts already this season as well.

On offense, Patrick Elias may be leading the team with 24 points, but he has struggled much of the season. Iin addition to leading the team in points, he also “leads” the team with a minus-12 plus/minus rating. For a guy who led the league with a plus-45 rating in 2001 that doesn’t sit well with him. Still, he has come around of late and has a six-game point scoring streak over which he has gone plus-one. That streak also happens to be during the time of the return of Scott Gomez from a groin injury.

The Devils continue to get their usual contributions from Gionta and Scott Gomez, but have also received solid contributions from Zach Parise (10G, 10A) and Jamie Langenbrunner (11G, 9A). After those players the scoring takes a nose-dive, with just Travis Zajac having more than five goals.

As for the Sabres, we shall see if they can duplicate the effort they gave in Montreal on Saturday night. As of this writing, it appears Teppo Numminen will miss a second-straight game with a broken toe, giving Andrej Sekera another NHL start. He had his share of miscues in Montreal, but I suspect that may be a function of adjusting to the speed of the NHL game. Overall, I was happy with what I saw from him.

Have the Sabres committed to Andrew Peters over Daniel Paille? Apparently, unless the Sabres are completely healthy, that may just be the case. Instead of carrying an extra forward, the Sabres have an “extra” defenseman in Andrej Sekera up with the team. The salary cap being what it is, that means Paille plays in Rochester.

7:00 “National” TV game on Versus tonight.