Thomas Vanek (photo: Bill Wippert)

The Buffalo Sabres today announced their 2008 pre-season schedule. The team will play seven games in 14 days, including two games at HSBC Arena and a road game in “Hockeyville.”

The Toronto Maple Leafs will visit HSBC Arena on Saturday, September 27, followed by another game the next night at the arena against the Minnesota Wild. Both games will start at 7 p.m.

Buffalo will begin their pre-season slate on Monday, September 22 in Toronto, before heading to Roberval, Quebec to face the Montreal Canadiens in the 2008 Kraft Hockeyville game. Roberval was the winner of a contest that was held to find Canada’s most passionate hockey community. After 1.8 million votes across Canada were collected to assemble the five finalist communities, Roberval was selected by capturing the majority of the over 5.5 million phone and online votes during the final week of voting in March, 2008.

The Sabres will close out their preseason schedule in Detroit on October 5 against the defending Stanley Cup Champion Red Wings.

Ticket information for the two home games will be announced at a later date.

Below is the 2008 preseason schedule.

DATE	OPPONENT	TIME	ARENA
September 22	@ Toronto	7:30 p.m.	Air Canada Centre
September 23	vs Montreal	7 p.m.	Roberval Community Arena
September 27	vs Toronto	7 p.m.	HSBC Arena
September 28	vs Minnesota	7 p.m.	HSBC Arena
October 1	@ Minnesota	8 p.m.	Xcel Energy Center
October 2	@ Columbus	7 p.m.	Nationwide Arena
October 5	@ Detroit	5 p.m.	Joe Louis Arena