Miller shows his patriotic spirit

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) - Sabres goalie Ryan Miller would love to help Team USA bring home the gold from the games and he's ready to face this challenge head-on.

Sabres fans know that Ryan Miller wears his emotions, but when he plays for team USA in the Olympics, he'll wear his patriotism on his goalie mask.

"I thought he did an amazing job," said Miller.

Ryan Miller will wear this specially designed goalie mask when he hits the ice in Vancouver. He wanted a patriotic theme, but he wanted it different than anything he'd seen.

"There was an idea I had about Uncle Sam years ago with the guy that paints my mask. When I was playing in Rochester he thought it would be cool to do something. In researching that and being a bit of a nerd using Google, there were a couple of paintings that come up where it looked like Uncle Sam was rolling his sleeve up to get into a fight. I always thought that was cool," explained Miller.

Ryan also tapped into the creativity of the artist who paints his Sabres goalie masks.

Miller said, "On the one side there's a bald eagle. I didn't have any say on that side, it was all him. I just said maybe an eagle on that side. He went nuts."

This mask also pays tribute to Jim Craig, who led the Miracle on the Ice team to the gold medal in 1980.

"There's shamrocks under each of my eyes. That's kind of in tribute to Jim Craig, who had them next to his eyes on his old-school mask he wore. Just little things of USA and USA hockey that stand out and are a little different," said Miller.

Miller debuts the mask on Tuesday afternoon when the USA plays Switzerland in their opening game.