Alex Tuch breaks a 1-1 tie in the third period to give the Sabres a 2-1 lead in the series with Boston.
The Buffalo Sabres were in a precarious position trailing 1-0 in the second period and facing a penaltyshot attempt from Viktor Arvidsson, who scored a pair of goals in the Boston Bruins 4-2 victory in Game 2 earlier this week. After a loss where Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen dropped the ball by allowing a center-ice dump-in to get past him and change the momentum of the series, Lyon stopped Arvidsson and gave the Sabres the boost they needed in a 3-1 victory in Game 3 at TD Garden on Thursday to take a 2-1 lead in the series.
"(The Lyon save was) definitely a turning point,” Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff said after the game. “I mean really bad luck, (Rasmus Dahlin) breaks a stick and can't do anything with the puck, and (Alex) came up with a huge save for us, at a crucial time of the game."
Bowen Byram tied the game soon after, and Alex Tuch scored the game winner early in the third period, with Noah Ostlund adding the empty-net insurance goal. The rookie center had a two-point night (1 goal, 1 assist) in his first NHL playoff game in relief of the injured Josh Norris.
“He's got experience, he's been in the (AHL) playoffs. Everybody's a little nervous going into a game like that, I totally understand that," Ruff said. "I thought (Noah) played a really solid game for us, a little disjointed with all the penalties, I'd like to see them play a little bit more because he was going so good. But for a first playoff game with us, you could say, gets an A plus."
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The power play continues to be a sore spot for the Sabres, as they went 0 for 5 in Game 3, and are 0 for 14 in the playoffs, but unlike the first two games in Buffalo, where Boston scored with the man advantage in each game, the Sabres killed off four penalties, including a pair of minors in the final 10 minutes of regulation with the Bruins pressing for the tying goal.
"We weren't really happy with our first couple kills. We lost a little bit of our positioning, and gave him a couple big opportunities. We went through through some of those after the first period. And I thought those last two kills were, were excellent," Ruff said "I thought we got a couple great blocks. I thought especially those top four guys up front they were killing and the (Conor)Timmins block, I thought (Mattias) Samuelsson was really solid around net front and didn't really give him that second opportunity."
The Sabres have an extra day of rest in before Game 4 on Sunday afternoon, and Ruff is conveying the message to his club not to get overconfident and flush the results of the win, just as he instructed them to get past the loss in Game 2.
"You've got to get through the emotion of losing a tough game. You lose at home, and you had all this emotion after Game 1. That's the battle of the playoffs is you've got to be ready to put put away a big win, like we have to be ready to put this game away and get ready for a really desperate team on Sunday in their building, Ruff said. "Just the same way they have to put the game away and and know that they got a battle to bounce back. It's something that our guys, some of them, haven't been through, but they've got a little bit of a taste of it."
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