Sabres lose pair in Dryden

The Fort Frances Jr. Sabres played their first-ever road game Friday night and absorbed their first-ever loss—falling 5-1 to the Dryden Ice Dogs.
The Sabres followed that effort up with a 7-3 thrashing on Saturday in Dryden, in which Fort Frances twice blew leads early in the game.
“I think what it basically came down to was we beat ourselves,” Sabres’ head coach Wayne Strachan said after Friday night’s game, blaming “mental mistakes” for the game getting out of reach so quickly.
“I don’t think you could look at the score as how the game was played. We had a lull in the second period and it cost us the game,” he added.
Things weren’t looking unwinnable after the first period as captain Quinn Amiel responded to two early power-play goals by host Dryden to enter the second period trailing just 2-1.
Dryden scored three unanswered goals within a five-minute span in the second to put their lead out of reach.
“First of all, I don’t know if we can accuse that on bus legs or what, but we came out flat in the first,” Amiel said. “Once they got their third goal, you saw our bench just deflate.”
The Sabres’ second game of the series was even more frustrating as the 7-3 loss came after Fort Frances gave up 1-0 and 3-1 leads.
Shawn Fulton netted his third of the season short-handed to open the scoring early in the first period Saturday while the team was killing a Shaun Egan cross-checking penalty.
Dryden’s Marlon Gardner evened things up 35 seconds into the second before Matthew York and Fulton netted power-play markers.
The game flew off the rails shortly after, with Dryden posting six unanswered goals to ice the victory.