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Miller, Sabres take shutout streak to Boston

Dec 7, 2010 - 3:47 PM (Sports Network) - The Buffalo Sabres will shoot for their first three-game winning streak of the season when they visit the rival Boston Bruins for this evening's clash at TD Garden.

The Sabres are coming off victories against Columbus and Ottawa, marking just the third time this year Buffalo has posted wins in consecutive games. The club's last three-game winning streak was from March 27-31 of last season.

Buffalo enters tonight fourth in the Northeast Division and is six points behind the second-place Bruins. Boston has also held the upper hand in the recent series with the Sabres, winning three of four and five of the last seven meetings between the clubs. The teams have split the last eight encounters in Boston.

The Bruins recorded a 5-2 victory when the clubs met on Nov. 3 in Buffalo to kick off this year's season series.

Buffalo goaltender Ryan Miller enters tonight on a hot streak, having posted back-to-back shutouts. Last year's Vezina Trophy winner made 19 saves in Friday's 5-0 win over Columbus and turned aside 32 shots in a 1-0 victory against Ottawa the following day.

"I think it's a case of the whole team playing better," Miller told Buffalo's official web site. "Everybody is starting to approach a place where we're on the same page, so I really think that goaltending is an absolute team position."

Miller is expected to start tonight's game and will carry his shutout streak of 148 minutes, 14 seconds into the contest. He has 19 shutouts in his career after posting his first two blankings of the season this past weekend.

Thomas Vanek provide all the offense in Saturday's win over Ottawa, scoring the game's lone shootout goal in the 1-0 decision.

Buffalo halted a three-game road losing streak with the win in Ottawa and is now 6-5-2 as the guest this season.

The Bruins had a two-game winning streak halted their last time out, dropping Saturday's shootout decision in Toronto. Former Boston winger Phil Kessel notched the winner in the shootout to lift the Maple Leafs to the 3-2 victory at Air Canada Centre.

Kessel began the third and final round by firing between the pads of Bruins goaltender Tim Thomas, and the force of the shot carried Thomas into the net and the puck over the goal line. Michael Ryder then clanged his shot off the left post to end the game.

Nathan Horton and Gregory Campbell scored for the Bruins, who had won two in a row by a combined 11-1 score coming into Saturday's game. Thomas was brilliant at times, but fell to 13-2-2 on the season despite stopping 38-of-40 shots.

Tonight marks the first test of a three-game homestand for Boston, which is just 5-5-2 on home ice this year compared to a 9-3-1 record on the road. The Bruins will also host the New York Islanders and Philadelphia during this residency.

Bruins forward Marc Savard will try to get his first point of the season tonight after being kept off the scoresheet in his first two outings of 2010-11. Savard made his season debut last Thursday against Tampa Bay after sitting out the first two months of the year with post-concussion syndrome.