FanHouse Nathan Horton

As Adam Gretz mentioned, Wednesday's Buffalo-Florida game featured a melee at the end. After Maxim Afinogenov capped a four-goal third for the Sabres with an empty-netter, Panther Nathan Horton took exception. Perhaps Horton thought Afingenov should have done the Penguin thing and missed the net. The ensuing scuffle broke out into a full-fledged fight between Craig Rivet of the Sabres and Florida's Keith Ballard. Here's a better look at all that transpired, featuring the awesomeness of Rick Jeanneret.

Hurricanes 3, Rangers 0: The good news for the Carolina Hurricanes is they seem to be playing their best hockey of the season at the absolute right time. The bad news is they still can't seem to gain any separation in the tight Eastern Conference playoff race.

Thanks to the Hurricanes 3-0 win over the New York Rangers on Monday, they jumped over three teams to move into a tie with Montreal for the No. 5 spot in the conference, but are guaranteed to fall as low as the No. 7 spot on Tuesday, depending on what happens in the Pittsburgh-Florida game. It's going to be like this every day for the rest of the regular season.

Devils 4, Avalanche 0: After missing most of the season with an elbow injury, legendary goalie Martin Brodeur returned to the New Jersey lineup on Thursday and did not disappoint, posting the 99th shutout of his career in a 4-0 win over Colorado.

Brodeur turned aside all 24 shots he faced, while Jamie Langenbrunner, Zach Parise, Patrick Elias and Travis Zajac all scored goals in the win. The Devils have been one of the top teams in the Eastern Conference all season, and adding one of the best goaltenders of all-time back into the lineup makes them a dangerous team going forward.

I never thought I'd say this but when the playoffs finally start, the Panthers are going to be a scary opponent for anyone to face presuming, of course, they make the playoffs.

Last night the Cats earned a 2-0 win over the Boston Bruins, the East's best team and arguably the best in the NHL. That is, if you look at the standings. The Panthers, currently tied for sixth in the Eastern Conference and caught up in a tight playoff race, are quietly emerging as a counterpart of the league's best teams.

It was one year ago Tuesday that we saw Richard Zednik involved in a horrific accident on the ice. The blade of teammate Olli Jokinen's skate cut Zednik's neck, severing his carotid artery. It was a frightening scene (this video is the least disgusting of the ones I could find, but it could still be disturbing for some of you). Obviously, Zednik is okay now, as he played in his 42nd game of the season Tuesday. While Zednik has tried not to think about last year's scare, it's hard not to notice what he was able to do on the one-year anniversary Tuesday, as the Panthers hosted Toronto.

Over the years, anti-smoking ad campaigns have taken many different forms. Some have been extreme, as here in New York they regularly show the internal organs of smokers while I'm eating breakfast. Smoker or not, I don't want to see anyone's insides while I'm eating first thing in the morning. Other ads, such as the Truth campaign, have taken a different angle. And then there's another angle that no one has really tried -- that is, until the Florida Panthers tried it. It's the pro-athlete-hypnosis technique. The Panthers have teamed with Tobacco Free Florida to give their local viewers on Fox Sports (about 2,000 people to be exact) a headache with an ad campaign featuring various Panthers speaking in front of a trippy background. The following video is one such example, featuring Nathan Horton.

Brian Burke's acquisition of tough-guy Brad May helped add to some of the intensity and entertainment value in Thursday's Montreal-Toronto game, as the two teams beat the snot out of one other physically, while the Canadiens dominated on the scoreboard, pulling out a 6-2 win. The victory for Montreal is its third in a row, and eighth in its past 10 games.

We've already talked about the penalties and wrestling matches between Mikhail Grabovski and a linesman, so let's talk about the game itself. The Canadiens jumped out to a 3-1 lead in the first period, thanks to goals from Sergei Kostitsyn, Maxim Lapierre and Guillaume Latendresse. Jaroslav Halak, making his fourth straight start in goal for Montreal, turned aside 30 shots to pick up his eighth win of the season.

Bruins 6, Senators 4: Boston snapped a brief two-game losing skid on Thursday night with a 6-4 win over Ottawa. The Bruins let a 3-1 lead slip away late in the second period, and then scored three consecutive goals of their own in the third, as Ottawa goalie Martin Gerber had a rather forgettable start in goal, stopping only 16 of 21 shots. Marc Savard scored what proved to be the game-winning goal, while also adding two assists.

Thanks to a pair of goals from Matt Ellis, the Buffalo Sabres ended Boston's 10-game winning streak with a 4-2 victory at TD Banknorth Garden on Saturday afternoon. The loss not only snaps Boston's 10-game winning streak, it also ended a 14-game home winning streak, while also giving the Bruins their sixth regulation loss of the season.

Ellis opened the scoring for the Sabres just three minutes into regulation, while Thomas Vanek added his 26th goal of the season just two minutes later.

After Phil Kessel cut the deficit in half with his 24th goal of the season, Ellis added his second goal of the game early in the second period to score what proved to be the game-winner. Paul Gaustad added his fourth goal of the year for the Sabres, while Ryan Miller turned aside 29 shots in net.

The win for Buffalo, combined with Pittsburgh's loss to Florida, moved the Sabres into the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

I'm sure the fans in Ottawa would have preferred I describe Roy as a "Rich Diver" or some other such thing, but considering he's the third centerman from last year's Sabres squad to get a substantial raise (and in Roy's case at least a 300% raise over last year's $627,000) in the past 4 weeks I think the 'little person' angle was more appropos, if a little tasteless.

According to WGR550 in Buffalo, the contract is a whopping 6 years in length for $24 million in total. Yearly breakdowns on the contract weren't found (and if anyone comes up with them, please leave a comment). The contract actually buys off 3 UFA years as Derek, 24, would have reached that status by 2010. My guess is that the contract rewards him handsomely for those seasons while keeping his salary low in the early seasons. This should help offset the sting of the $8 million in signing bonuses that have to go to Thomas Vanek, as per the contract Kevin "Douchebag" Lowe signed him to earlier in the month.

Sabres GM, Darth Regier was on WGR this morning with Howard Simon saying that he expected to go through with the arbitration hearing this afternoon. Surprisingly, it sounded like it was Regier who was putting forth the longer term contract to Roy and his agent (at least that's what I took from Regier's comments) but that it looked unlikely they would come to an agreement before the hearing. As well, they were expecting a 2 year arbitration award.

Given yesterday's latest publicity stunt (and reasonably shrewd move) by the aforementioned "Douchebag," and the previous contracts handed out to players like Pierre-Marc Bouchard ($2.6 million), Lee Stempniak (3yrs, $7.5 million) and Nathan Horton (6yrs, $24 million), Roy's contract doesn't seem like an extravagent over-payment for a 2nd line center who kills penalties and should be a point-per-game player as he enters his prime. But, then again, when this season ended I was expecting to see Vanek signed to a similar contract to Horton's and Roy to Stempniak's.... my how monetary inflation has an effect on things.

With this signing the Sabres stand at around $44 million against the cap with just defenseman Nathan Paetsch to sign. His arbitration hearing is set for Thursday, August 2nd. I fully expect Regier to get Paetsch signed to a contract before then.

Ta,