War of the words; Ruff and Julien

This is turning into a pretty good drama between the two teams, it's playoff hockey. Personally, I hate the Buffalo Sabres and they sound like a bunch of whinny little cry babies, there has been excessive complaining about the officiating in this series by the Buffalo Sabres coaching staff. The fact remains that the officiating has been poor both ways. The game prior their coach Lindy Ruff had a temper tantrum at the post game press conference. I love it. I expect the next game to be even more intense. Some of this stuff is also tin foil hat crap though.

"I said [Friday] night, you run the risk of being suspended," Ruff said on Saturday. "The league's interpretation is what it is. I was arguing for the instigator. That's why I stayed on the bench. I had [Craig Rivet] go over and say, 'That's an instigator.'

"It really doesn't matter what I think. It really doesn't," Ruff added. "I don't think that little slash [from Gaustad] hurt [Chara], though. An instigator is an instigator. The referees deemed [Gaustad] was the instigator. I can find lots of little slashes in the game if you want me to find that."

In his media briefing on Saturday, Julien said he hoped Ruff was simply using coaching tactics and didn’t need any cheese with his whine. He also reiterated his disgust with what he believes to be one-sided officiating leaning in the Sabres’ favor.

"I've heard and read Lindy's comments," Julien said. "Hopefully, it's his way of taking pressure off his team. If not, it's a lot of whining. Simple as that. Every coach has his tactics. You just worry about yourself. We seem to be the team that's doing bad things. They seem to be the team that's on the nice side of all that stuff and they do nothing wrong. It's tactics. Those are things in the playoffs that coaches use, hopefully to their advantage. I don't pay much attention to it."

There is some speculation around the NHL that the league tends to resist suspending star players in the playoffs, and Ruff was asked if maybe that was the case here with Chara.

"I've heard that argument before and I'm not even going to go down that road,” Ruff said.

Rivet, the Sabres captain, also chimed in, saying he expected the Bruins captain to be in the lineup Monday.

"I'm not really surprised," Rivet said. "It's something I expect at this time of year. I think the action would have to be a lot worse to get a suspension. He was a little bit frustrated at the end of the game but I don't think it was really cause for a suspension."

One thing is for sure though: If Gaustad or any other Sabres player wants to take liberties with a Bruin again, they will get a similar reaction. Chara’s actions were questioned, because he could have put his team in a tough position if he was suspended. But with two seconds on the clock and the Sabres up 4-1, he and the Bruins weren’t about to let Gaustad and the Sabres rub salt in the wound.

“We stand up for ourselves, too, and it is about doing it at the right time,” Julien said. “Sometimes a guy takes a cheap shot at you at the time of the game, it gives you a power, play and you say, 'Well, OK, I know who it is and it is a long game.’ But the game [was] over [when Gaustad hit Chara]. Obviously, it was a cheap shot and it was unwarranted -- the two-hander -- and [Chara] responded.[NESN.COM]