We doubted that sports editor Charley Young made that decision. Besides that, there was an appearance of a conflict of interest. Coppola worked for the Sabres on game nights, preparing material for the message board in the Aud.

In the middle of the Sabres-Canadiens series some decision-makers at The News must have agreed. To my surprise I was assigned to take over for Coppola as the second man on the series. Until then, I had experienced the Sabres only as a fan.

When I had the chance between Braves games I often took in Sabres games, many of them memorable. That was especially true the night Gerry Meehan scored the goal on the last night of the 1971-72 season against Philadelphia and knocked the Flyers out of the playoffs.

I once received a pair of skates and a stick from Santa at Christmas, but hardly used them. I came from a hockey town, however. Our high school had had varsity hockey since the early 1930s. There was good college and pro hockey with Yale and Lynn Patrick, Ott Heller and Jack Evans with the New Haven Ramblers of the AHL and later Don Perry and the New Haven Blades in the East Coast League. The last hockey game I actually reported on was probably in the New England High School tournament in Providence, R.I. ten years before.