Greetings from Sabres practice, where everyone is skating. The more interesting work is being done off the ice.
The Sabres' home opener is Friday night, and First Niagara Center is crawling with folks trying to transform the building from HSBC Arena to its new name. There are workers on the roof scrubbing off the lingering letters of HSBC and installing lights of First Niagara. In the atrium, painters are on ladders above the arena doors making sure people are welcomed to First Niagara Center, not HSBC Arena. And inside the bowl, a few people are going row-to-row in every section putting stickers on the end seats, which have the HSBC bank logo on them.
---John Vogl
