I’m a nerd.

I am publishing — if you want to call it that — an import file for Outlook with the entire 2008-9 regular season for the Buffalo Sabres.

I know that you can get the schedule from a zillion locations.  What’s different about mine?  I added the location for each game in the format “Arena Name (City, State/Province - Country)”.  I also set the “Private” flag and added a category of “sabres hockey”.

I am currently living in the Central timezone, so I have two files here to download:

Buffalo Sabres / 2008-9 Regular Season / Outlook Import File / Eastern timezone

  2008-9 Buffalo Sabres Schedule - Outlook - Eastern (11.2 KiB, 128 hits)

Buffalo Sabres / 2008-9 Regular Season / Outlook Import File / Central timezone

  2008-9 Buffalo Sabres Schedule - Outlook - Central (11.2 KiB, 63 hits)

– Destructions for Importing into Outlook –

1.  Click on the link for the schedule you wish to download and “Save target as”/”Save file” to your computer.  Remember where you saved the file to!
2.  In Outlook, click on “File -> Import and Export” from the toolbar
3.  Select “Import from another program or file” and click “Next”
4.  Select “Comma Separated Values (Windows)” and click “Next”
5.  Browse to where you saved the download file, highlight it and click “OK”. Make sure the path to that file is correct in the “File to import:” area
6.  Do not change anything under “Options”
7.  Highlight “Calendar” under “Select destination folder:” and click “Next”
8.  Make sure there is a check in the box in “The following actions will be performed:” to the left of “Import…”
9.  Click on “Finish”
10.  Do a happy dance.

excellent!  the rumours are true!  the worst kept secret in the hockey world was that the winter classic 2009 would be in chicago.

apparently, after negotiations with nyc and yankee stadium did not pan out, the league turned to chicago for the game.

last year it was in buffalo at the ralph which looked so amazing on the 120″ screen while we were on vacation in north carolina.

this year will be even better.

we are blackhawks season ticket holders!!  WOO!!

the game will be on 1 january 2009 at 100pm eastern between the chicago blackhawks and the detroit red wings.  at…  wait for it…  wrigley field!

i can’t wait!

the blue bombers (d6) started out the fall season on the right foot taking out the wildmen 5-1.

it was a great team effort with a really long bench.  dom showed no rust in goal…

personally…  i scored the first goal from the low circle with a circus slash bad angle shot that dropped through the goalie’s pads.  and…  i scored the last goal on a breakaway — my first shot went directly to the goalie’s shoulder and dropped down in front where i poked it through on the same stick movement.  sweet!

wooo!!

after almost 6 years, 18 seasons and 5 teams at chelsea piers…  i am part of a winner!

the blue heroes took out the blights in the championship game with a shutout victory — 4-0.

the “heroes”?

jeremy…  with a natural hat trick!  and…  adam…  with yet another shutout!

on to the fall season…

the blue heroes breezed (and i HATE saying that) through the semi-final for the summer season winning 10-0.

the other team only iced 5 skaters and conceded after the first period which, technically, means we won 8-0.

either way, we are headed to the final.  nice!

i scored twice…  off the opening faceoff, i pushed forward and past one D to get a clear shot — straight and low to the corner of the net.  elapsed time?  ~5 seconds.  my second goal had me in the high slot and taking a nice feed off my skate, directly to my stick and whipped high corner.

my summer hockey team — a combination of my d5 and d6 teams at chelsea piers — finished the regular season…

undefeated, bay-bee!  8-0

i only had the chance to play in half the games, sadly, due to travel and illness, but i always enjoy the summer format — 4-on-4, two 25 minute running time periods, no icing…

we finished with the second best goals for (46) and the second lowest goals against (18), but with the best +/- (28).

the summer playoffs are one and done, so we will see what happens in the semi-finals…

in the first game of the summer 4-0n-4 season, the blue heroes (yes, yes…  my d5 and d6 teams combine in the summer — blue bombers + homer’s heroes = blue heroes!) took out pond hockey by a score of 9-1.

that’s right.  9-1.

i was uncharacteristically late for the game.  i try to take a small nap before weeknight hockey games because my adrenaline — post-game — is always so high and i have trouble getting to sleep.  unfortunately, my alarm did not go off as planned.  i arrived with 15 minutes to go in the first period…  and we were already up 5-0.  well done!

it was certainly not a good match up.  for the most part, we were skating in/around/over/through them the entire game.  if they had 5 shots on goal, i would be shocked.  their goalie was so exhausted, he actually took himself out of the game with 10 minutes to go in the final period.  i had never seen that before!

i thought we did quite well in the final period with puck movement — we did a lot of passing instead of trying to shoot on every play and i really like seeing that kind of discipline when one team is up by so many goals…

personally, i had a bunch of chances and connected on one that was a self-rebound off the boards behind the net and then slammed upstairs.

i have tried, over the years, to keep track of many of the sabres players i grew up watching.  so many have become formative pieces of the buffalo organization, while others have had great success with other teams…  i suppose the best example would be lindy ruff, #22, who is now the coach of the sabres…

jim schoenfeld is certainly one of those guys!  i used to love to watch him play D.  he always had his “head on a swivel” and could always be counted on to give up the body in the defensive zone.  he was often known as a “goalie’s best friend”…

he has spent the last coupla years coaching the rangers AHL team in hartford and now…

he has been named the assistant gm for the new york rangers!

woo!  i hope i get to see him at a few games this season…

ugh.

we did it again. the blue bombers ended a great spring 2007 season with a tough 5-2 loss in the first round of the playoffs against the gulls.

just like last year — except we did not have to go to the hospital after the game.

the gulls are a tough team. less tough this season, but still formidable.

before the game, i had two pieces of coaching for the team… the first was that we were shooting on a goalie that had not played with the gulls all season. i like that, most of the time, because it means that communication is not at its zenith. the second was that we needed to play OUR game and let them react to us and not the other way around. often, when you play teams that have been together for a while, part of their strength comes from making YOU react to what they are doing…

well…

we did not get enough shots.

we totally played in reactive mode chasing them all over the place.

you cannot win that way.

personally… i was ecstatic that alison came out to the game! it was great to see her on the boards and it was an amazing help to me personally. i had a few chances… the best being a race/break in the offensive zone that i took from right to left. i saw five hole — about 4-6 inches — and went for it. i hit just above the point i was shooting for and it bounced back to me where i tried to slam it… but the five hole was gone. i coulda/shoulda/woulda have continued to my left and gone backhand… my other great chance was on a loose puck in the low slot that i tried to slam home into a mostly empty net. unfortunately, the puck was on edge and i ended up putting it over the boards behind the net…

on to the summer season…

in our last game of the regular season, the blue bombers took down our doppelgangers the (red) bombers by a score of 5-4.

sounds a lot closer than it was — for most of the game.

we had a 4-0 lead through 1/3 of the third period and then things went a bit awry… we gave up a few funky goals and had some defensive lapses. we came out with the win, though.

personally, i scored on a wrister that hit the goalie’s shoulder and bounced into the net behind him.

peter was great in net — it was really cool of him to fill in for dom…

bob had some key defensive plays in third — cleanly tracking down to breakaways.

on to the playoffs… next friday… against the gulls.