Rangers Just 7 Seconds Short [J. Mark English]

7...6...5...4...3...2...1 Seven seconds. That is how close the New York Rangers were to victory in game 5 against the Buffalo Sabres. But Buffalo squeaked out a goal in those final seconds, forced overtime, and then won on a decisive power play. I wanted to vomit after the winning goal by the Sabres. Instead of recapping this game myself, I turn to Larry Brooks of the New York Post:

Now the Rangers have history as well as a buoyant Buffalo team to overcome as they head home for Game 6 tomorrow afternoon, needing a victory to stay alive in this Eastern Conference semifinal of which they had seemed to seize control.

Instead, they are the Heartbroken Kids following last night's 2-1 OT loss to the Sabres in a match Chris Drury tied with 7.7 seconds to go in regulation, the very same 7.7 seconds that remained in regulation when Valeri Zelepukin beat Mike Richter to force OT in Game 7 of the epochal 1994 conference finals against the Devils.

But this time there was no Stephane Matteau to come to the rescue. This time, there was Maxim Afinogenov ripping a 45-foot power-play drive from the top off Jed Ortmeyer's stick to beat Henrik Lundqvist at 4:39 of OT to propel the Sabres to a 3-2 lead in this best-of-7 series.

Just a brief comments -

I will say this...they were shut out on seven power plays. Thats could be equated to a football team being inside their opponents red zone seven times and not getting any points.

In the previous games the Rangers let the Sabres have too many power plays. In this game the Rangers had plenty of opportunities and the Sabres snuffed each one out.