Lindy Ruff, Alex Tuch and Josh Doan respond to controversial comments from Marco Sturm.

The Buffalo Sabres received some pretty good bulletin board material from their opponents in the opening round of the Stanley Cup playoffs this past week when Bruins head coach Marco Sturm made some strongly worded comments about the Sabres players and their head coach.

Those comments have unsurprisingly since made their way into the Sabres locker room with just about everyone having heard what Sturm had to say, and that has in turn prompted a response from several of the members of that locker room.

Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff, who was personally called out by name during Sturm's recent comments, shared his thoughts on what Sturm had to say ahead of Game 1.

"You know that's his take on his team," said Ruff. "I have a lot of respect for what our team has done and how we play, the speed at which we play the game. They've got a good team, they know who they are and we know who we are."

Sabres veteran forward Alex Tuch responded by suggesting that the Sabres will be bringing the physicality in this series.

"That's his analysis of it," said Tuch. "When it comes to the playoffs everyone had to play big and strong to be able to win. I think we have a lot of guys in here that are gonna up the physicality."

Josh Doan on the other hand seemed to brush the comments off entirely, choosing to focus inward instead of listening to the outside noise.

"Obviously we've all seen it," admitted Doan. "At the end of the day our group trusts what we're doing here and we'll just let that play out through the series. We're gonna stick to our game plan. It's one of those things that you see but at the end of the day no real response from us in this room."

The stage has certainly been set for an exciting Game 1 between these two teams.