fromPierre LeBrun of ESPN,

On his way out of the Air Canada Centre after a morning skate that was missing a familiar face, Ryan Miller reflected on Day 1 without his longtime coach Lindy Ruff.

"Lindy did a lot for me in my career," the Buffalo Sabres star netminder told ESPN.com Thursday before a game against the Toronto Maple Leafs. "He gave me an opportunity to go in the net. It takes a lot of trust to keep putting a goalie back in the net. I got my start with Lindy. We had some good years and some tough ones in there too. But we went through the ups and downs and I have a lot of respect for him. Considering how long he’s been there, I wish we had done better by him so he could have had a little bit of a cleaner break, I guess. Although in pro sports, you rarely get that."

Looking back, was Miller sensing Ruff’s job was in trouble when he delivered a postgame rant Sunday directed at his teammates?

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