It's little things like face-off wins that give us early puck posession. It's little things like firing at the net without cease. It's little things like your top line waking up and doing some damage. Add it all up and you have a Sens crew that is hard to conted with as the Buffalo Sabres found out last night.



By far the best player on the ice was Daniel Alfredsson who once again played a complete game, both offensively and defensively. Alfie scored two goals, one assist, and was responsible for the 4 on 2 break-out that scored the Senators fifth goal of the night. He kept feeding Jason Spezza who, unfortunately, kept missing. Not that Spezza had a bad night. Quite the opposite. He picked up two assists on the night and, while he didn't succeed in potting one, he did try including a breakaway on a great feed from Milan Michalek. Spezza's missing on this was very un-Spezza like. He had the room to make a couple of moves but decided to play it straight and shoot. Michalek himself had a tremendous game, skating hard, shooting on net, and almost permanently parking his butt in Sabres goalie Patrick Lalime's face.

Filip Kuba was another who was all over the ice last night, picking up a goal and 3 assists, a new personal best for him. Defensively, Kuba was also rock solid especially on the last PK of the game where his play was instrumental in keeping the Sabres bottled up. Mike Fisher, who was playing without his usual partner Alex Kovalev, was still magnificent. He only picked up one assist on the night, but this in no way represents his level of play last night. He was always a threat and gave it all on every shift.

Goalie Pascal Leclaire was inspired between the pipes and even though he suffered a lower body injury early in the second, managed to finish the period in style. Brian Elliott came in and finished the game for the Sens and was also rock solid and at times truly excellent between the pipes.

The list of excellence goes on and on: Matt Carkner, Chris Kelly who scored his second goal in as many games, Nick Foligno whose speed and stick handling were very good. He impressed me during the 3rd period when he was offside on a dump in, raced to the line to tag up, went back in stole the puck and got a shot off on Lalime. That's presence.

The only downside is the Sens sat back a little after scoring their fith and allowed the Sabres back into the game. This is a tendency we've seen before, one that has bitten the Sens in the butt in the past. But I'm nitpicking here. This is a turning point for the Senators' season, and I hope they cash in on it.