Buffalo, N.Y. – Leave it to Daniel Alfredsson – the Ottawa Senators’ captain and longest serving player – to score the biggest goal in team history.
With one clutch shot at 9:32 of overtime, Alfredsson ended a decade’s worth of frustration by sending the Senators to the Stanley Cup finals for the first time.
His goal sealed a 3-2 win over the top-seeded Buffalo Sabres on Saturday, allowing Ottawa to win the Eastern Conference finals in five games.
No one needed to remind Alfredsson that he was the only one to have played in Ottawa’s 94 playoff games over 10 consecutive years, or that it took that long for the Senators to finally shed their reputation as postseason underachievers.
“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. But I think they ran into us at the wrong time.”
The Senators improved to an NHL best 12-3 this postseason and have yet to lose two games in any series after eliminating New Jersey and Pittsburgh in five games each in the first two rounds.
Sweetest of all, perhaps, Ottawa had been eliminated by Buffalo in its previous three playoff meetings, including last year’s second round.
“What else can you say about Alfie?” Ottawa forward Jason Spezza said. “He’s been our leader the whole time.”
It came on what began as an innocent-looking play, accepting Dany Heatley’s pass on the fly and breaking into the Sabres zone on a 1-on-3 rush. Using Buffalo defenseman Brian Campbell as a screen, Alfredsson had his shot tip off the defender’s stick and sneak just inside the right post.
The Presidents’ Trophy-winning Sabres were knocked out in the semifinals for the second straight year.
“It’s tough to swallow,” Sabres co-captain Daniel Briere said. “I really believed it was our year.”
