Ottawa 3, Buffalo 2, OT
If your are a Buffalo Sabres player or fan, you look at the box score for game 4 of this series and you don’t see those names that have haunted your team throughout these playoffs. You start to think this is the key to the series, stop these guys from scoring!! 
And then game 5 comes along in your building and you feel a sense of comeback, a chance to win. But after the game, you look at the score sheet and there they are again, haunting you: Daniel Alfredsson, Dany Heatley, and Jason Spezza.
It took an extra period but the Ottawa Senators have made the trip to the Stanley Cup Finals thanks to Alfredsson, the Senators’ captain and longest serving player. With one clutch shot at 9:32 of overtime, Alfredsson ended a decade’s worth of frustration by sending the Senators to the championship for the first time. That goal made the final score 3-2, ending the series, 4-1.
Alfredsson and his line mates were all over the score sheet in this game. It took awhile, but after Jochen Hecht scored at 4:30 of the second period to put Buffalo up 1-0, the Senators top line decided to kick it up a notch with Heatley and Spezza scoring goals less than four minutes apart, the latter goal coming with only 39 seconds left in the period. Heatley scored to tie the game 1-1 as he slammed home a rebound just five seconds after a Buffalo penalty had expired and Spezza scored into a wide open net on a perfect pass from centre Daniel Alfredsson.
Being up 2-1 was a good thing for the Senators as they were lucky to survive. They almost self-destructed on penalties, taking five minors in the third penalty alone. Maxim Afinogenov’s power-play goal halfway through a frantic third period tied the game 2-2 for the Sabres.
And then it was Alfie’s turn. Skating across the blue line, 1 on 3, he flipped a shot to Ryan Miller low on the glove side and it went past the stretching goalie. Miller stood at the bench afterward, shaking his head and rubbing his eyes. “It surprised the heck out of me,” Miller said, referring to Alfredsson’s goal. “He kind of hung me out. I didn’t get a real good look and obviously, I came up missing it.”
“It’s kind of surreal right now,” Alfredsson said. “We worked very hard for this, but you never take anything for granted. … We respect Buffalo as a team. I think they’ve had a hell of a year. But I think they ran into us at the wrong time.”
“Hockey has a funny way of working out like that,” Heatley said. “A lot of that criticism of (Alfredsson) was so unfair. He comes to the rink every day with a great attitude and works so hard, I can’t say enough about him.
“It’s nice to see him get this recognition.”
Senators coach Bryan Murray, who will be going to the Cup final for the first time as a coach, echoed that sentiment. “He has been a star the whole way through here,” he said.
“For him to get the goal is real justice to the way he has worked and played. He has been the example, a workhorse for the team.
“It was a 1-on-3 rush and he scored, and that’s something special.”
What is special is a line like Daniel Alfredsson, Dany Heatley, and Jason Spezza, seven points in this game, and a trip to the Big One!
And then game 5 comes along in your building and you feel a sense of comeback, a chance to win. But after the game, you look at the score sheet and there they are again, haunting you: Daniel Alfredsson, Dany Heatley, and Jason Spezza.It took an extra period but the Ottawa Senators have made the trip to the Stanley Cup Finals thanks to Alfredsson, the Senators’ captain and longest serving player. With one clutch shot at 9:32 of overtime, Alfredsson ended a decade’s worth of frustration by sending the Senators to the championship for the first time. That goal made the final score 3-2, ending the series, 4-1.
Alfredsson and his line mates were all over the score sheet in this game. It took awhile, but after Jochen Hecht scored at 4:30 of the second period to put Buffalo up 1-0, the Senators top line decided to kick it up a notch with Heatley and Spezza scoring goals less than four minutes apart, the latter goal coming with only 39 seconds left in the period. Heatley scored to tie the game 1-1 as he slammed home a rebound just five seconds after a Buffalo penalty had expired and Spezza scored into a wide open net on a perfect pass from centre Daniel Alfredsson.
Being up 2-1 was a good thing for the Senators as they were lucky to survive. They almost self-destructed on penalties, taking five minors in the third penalty alone. Maxim Afinogenov’s power-play goal halfway through a frantic third period tied the game 2-2 for the Sabres.
And then it was Alfie’s turn. Skating across the blue line, 1 on 3, he flipped a shot to Ryan Miller low on the glove side and it went past the stretching goalie. Miller stood at the bench afterward, shaking his head and rubbing his eyes. “It surprised the heck out of me,” Miller said, referring to Alfredsson’s goal. “He kind of hung me out. I didn’t get a real good look and obviously, I came up missing it.”
“It’s kind of surreal right now,” Alfredsson said. “We worked very hard for this, but you never take anything for granted. … We respect Buffalo as a team. I think they’ve had a hell of a year. But I think they ran into us at the wrong time.”
“Hockey has a funny way of working out like that,” Heatley said. “A lot of that criticism of (Alfredsson) was so unfair. He comes to the rink every day with a great attitude and works so hard, I can’t say enough about him.
“It’s nice to see him get this recognition.”
Senators coach Bryan Murray, who will be going to the Cup final for the first time as a coach, echoed that sentiment. “He has been a star the whole way through here,” he said.
“For him to get the goal is real justice to the way he has worked and played. He has been the example, a workhorse for the team.
“It was a 1-on-3 rush and he scored, and that’s something special.”
What is special is a line like Daniel Alfredsson, Dany Heatley, and Jason Spezza, seven points in this game, and a trip to the Big One!
