Editor's Note: While Wally Pipp is on vacation in Atlantis (yes, we know where it is and no we won't tell you) MF37 of Bitter Leaf Fan has once again gotten the tap on the shoulder.

D.O. at Die by the Blade's post-game analysis begins with an interesting question:

What do you say after an embarrassing loss at home to inferior team?

Little known fact: That very question was nearly the Leafs' official slogan under the previous administration.

Continuing the theme of self-loathing, D.O. offers up the following Leaf-tastic adjectives to describe the Sabres' performance:

embarrassing, disgraceful, ugly, uninspired, irritating and eventually I settle on deplorable.  The Sabres effort tonight was deplorable.

Little known fact: I think about half of those adjectives are on the official "Welcome to Buffalo Sign"

The Buffalo News Blog Sabres Edge thought they had the big story: the Sabres entered the night having scored 9,998 franchise goals.

Knowing the Leafs' record in Buffalo, their tendency to give up a five-spot each night, and their propensity to be on the wrong side of history, was there a safer bet than the Leafs being victimized for the Sabres franchise goal 10,000?

It's over: A bad 2-1 loss. Final shots 33-25. Oh yeah, still stuck at 9,999. Call it the curse of 10,000.

While the Leafs didn't cough up goal 10,000 they did (once again) give a playerhis first goal of the season.

Little known fact: After seeing the Lydman highlight, Wade Belak is getting the stick wax ready and checking out the schedule to see when the Preds are due to meet up with the Leafs. He's hoping to break the goose egg against the Buds.

Sabres Blog The Goose's Roost saw this loss coming:

That was... kind of predictable. You outplay a team for two periods and suddenly it's a tie game going into the third. If you've been following this Sabres team for the past few seasons you could sort of feel it coming. At the time I said that if they didn't score during the four minute power play coming out of the intermission they would lose. Think about the way momentum shifted at the end of the second period, a four minute penalty kill is only going to add to surge. The Sabres weren't capitalizing on their chances, and sooner or later those chances would run out and the Leafs would get a lucky one.

Little known fact: I've got nothing here. But I do have to ask about the name of this blog. Other than wings, what do Geese and Chickens have to do with Buffalo? Neither of these species are expert divers so it's not like that's the link to the Sabres...

The official story line from the Buffalo News is bad ice, missed chances and the inability to close the deal:

The game-winner came with 7:56 left as Ian White’s shot from the point hit the ice and sprung over the shoulder of a stunned Ryan Miller. "It’s my home rink. I should know better," Miller said. "Our ice is terrible toward the end of the game."

...

The Sabres missed four other glorious opportunities: Stafford fired wide from point-blank range early; Thomas Vanek and Paul Gaustad passed up shots on short-handed odd-man rushes; and Toskala’s split save robbed Ales Kotalik coming out of the penalty box.

It was more of the same early in the second period. The Sabres controlled play, and the line of Vanek, Jochen Hecht and Jason Pominville basically set up camp in the Toronto zone.

But the second goal didn’t come. Had the Sabres taken advantage, Leafs fans could have been back across the border by 10 p. m.

Little known fact: bad ice, missed chances and the inability to close the deal were the exact same excuses I used to cite on a bad Friday night when I was a single man.

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I haven't linked to any Toronto media because if we keep reading their content, providing them with click-throughs and high traffic numbers there's no reason for them to change. Besides, the story line will be the Leafs got lucky and beat a better team who had an off night.

Well known fact: You could write the Toronto media's take in your sleep.