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Sabres Beat Leafs In a Wild One

By WKBW News

Sabres Beat Leafs In a Wild One

December 17, 2011 Updated Dec 17, 2011 at 12:16 PM EDT

Buffalo (WKBW.com) Thomas Vanek scored a pair of goals in his 500th career game to pace the Sabres to a 5-4 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs on Friday night. The victory capped off a five game home stand for Buffalo



The Leafs took seven penalties in the second period and the Sabres were able to make them pay on the power play. Buffalo went 3-for-6 with the man advantage, scoring all three power play goals in the second period. Drew Stafford, Tyler Ennis and Andrej Sekera all scored on the power play for Buffalo to help the Sabres to a 4-2 lead after two.



But the night belonged to Vanek. He finished with four points in the victory. His first goal of the night tied the game at two in the second period. Vanek rifled his 15th of the season home following a nice play by Zach Kassian. He would strike again in the third period scoring on a breakaway set up Derek Roy. That goal gave the Sabres a short lived 5-3 lead. Mikhail Grabovski scored just 29 seconds later to pull the Leafs within a goal at 5-4, but Buffalo held on.



Ryan Miller made 29 saves in the win. The Sabres head to Pittsburgh to play the Penguins on Saturday night.

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