By Danny Picard
CSNNE.com
BOSTON -- The Bruins blew two leads in regulation and paid for it in overtime, as former Bruin Brad Boyes scored the game-winner with 1:16 left and gave the Buffalo Sabres a 4-3 win over Boston on Thursday night at the TD Garden.
Boyes skated hard to the left post and tapped in a Nathan Gerbe shot from the lower left circle, after Bruins goaltender Tim Thomas was caught out of position when a shot from the point hit him in the right shoulder and popped out to his right.
Gerbe picked up the loose puck and sent it in between Thomas and the left post to a wide-open Boyes for the game-winner.
Gregory Campbell had put the Bs up 3-2, just 2:18 into the third, knocking home a loose puck out front, after Zdeno Charas blast from the point bounced off several players.
But Buffalo tied the game nearly three minutes later, while on its second 5-on-3 power play of the game, when a puck thrown out front was knocked in by Tim Connolly.
The Bruins and Sabres went into the third period tied at 2-2, after Tyler Ennis and Thomas Vanek each scored in the final eight minutes of the second.
Boston Bruins
Mark Recchi had given the Bs a 2-0 lead with 8 12 minutes left in the period, knocking in a loose puck out front that was the result of Charas puck work down low, forcing Miller to be out of position. Chara then dished a pass out front and, after Michael Ryder hit the post, Recchi swooped in to knock it home.
Twenty-seven seconds later, Ennis cut the lead to 2-1, and Vanek followed it up with the tying goal, with 1:08 remaining in the period, on a puck that Thomas eventually knocked into his own net with his skate.
The Bs took a 1-0 lead into the second, after some pretty passing by David Krejci and Milan Lucic set up Nathan Horton with an easy goal at the right post. Krejci came down the middle and sent a pass to Lucic in the left circle, who then sent a perfect pass out front to Horton, who tapped it in. Danny Picard is on Twitter at http:twitter.comDannyPicard. You can listen to Danny on his streaming radio show I'm Just Sayin' Monday-Friday from 9-10 a.m. on CSNNE.com.