As training camp opens on Thursday, let the battles begin to make the 23-man roster.

To get ready for the upcoming Buffalo Sabres season, I’ll be previewing most of those involved in the eventual successes and failures by going through the alphabet using a different word each time – a revolutionary theme if there ever was one.

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Competition

Buffalo Sabres training camp opens today and it’s the appropriate time to break down everything right? Well, let’s just ease into things instead of going gangbusters into it because there’s a lot to parse out.

We’re going to go over the likely roster and plot out where the position competitions lie. We got a taste for what the younger generation of future Sabres might bring to the table in training camp during the Prospects Challege.

We saw Matt Savoie, Jiri Kulich, Isak Rosén, and Zach Benson are all dynamite players with very bright futures. We witnessed Ryan Johnson being the best among the defensemen and that he’ll be a guy who won’t need a lot of time in Rochester to be able to provide help in Buffalo. We also saw there is a lot of raw talent that needs time, as well. Fortunately, the Sabres are well-stocked, and those players will get all the time they’ll need.

Let’s get to it — we’ll break things down by groups: forwards, defensemen, goalies. The Sabres are bringing 64 players to camp and only 23 healthy players will make it to the opening night roster October 12.

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Here’s how we’ll go about this: Player names that are bolded are locks for the roster. Common sense would’ve told us they were part of the team anyway, but visually speaking, making it bold makes it like we’re writing it in ink. Isn’t the internet wonderful?

Let’s get to it. The asterisk (*) means a player is injured and fortunately those are at a minimum to start the year, albeit they’re stuck on some important players.

FORWARDS

Tage Thompson

Jeff Skinner

Alex Tuch

Dylan Cozens

JJ Peterka

Jack Quinn*

Jordan Greenway

Casey Mittelstadt

Tyson Jost

Kyle Okposo

Zemgus Girgensons

Peyton Krebs

Victor Olofsson

Matt Savoie*

Lukas Rousek

Isak Rosén

Jiri Kulich

Zach Benson

So… There’s a little bit of a problem, isn’t there?

We’ve got 13 forwards booked for spots on the roster, one of whom, Jack Quinn, will be out until December or January recovering from a ruptured Achilles’ tendon. With 12 healthy players, it opens up at least one and at most two spots for other forwards to join the party.

After the first couple games of the Prospects Challenge, Savoie was in prime position for another one of them, but he sustained an upper-body injury in the first shift of the final game of the challenge against Pittsburgh and will miss the start of training camp. Lance reported it’s a left shoulder injury which the Sabres will take their time with. We’ll find out more about his condition, ideally, on Thursday morning when GM Kevyn Adams speaks to open up camp, but there’s no reason to distrust Lance’s reporting on this one.

Savoie played fast, dynamic hockey against the Canadiens and Devils prospects and showed all of the skill that made him the Sabres No. 9 pick in 2022. With the Sabres having five preseason games next week (five of the seven scheduled, mind you) that could affect how much Savoie can show how ready he is for NHL play. Based on the tiny sample of two games against younger peers, I want to see more of Savoie against tougher competition and with NHL teammates. With injury likely cutting into those opportunities, it stinks. It also wreaks havoc on what to do with him once he’s healthy.

Since Savoie, for now, would need to go back to Wenatchee in the WHL if he doesn’t make the NHL roster, he could make the team, injured or not, and slow play his stay with the big club. Putting him on injured reserve will preserve a spot for him and injury rehab as well as a possible rehab assignment to Rochester would keep him around beyond that, but whether Buffalo kept him beyond that becomes a curious game.

Savoie still needs development time and sitting out with an injury takes away from that. Keeping him in Buffalo beyond that and carefully playing him until it’s time to decide where he goes after he’s played nine games. Practicing with the NHL team is good for young players, but how they want to go about handling Savoie once he’s ready and recovered will affect how the rest of his season goes.

He’s still eligible for Canada’s World Junior Championship team this year and whether or not Adams seeks to get Savoie cleared to play in the AHL, similar to how the Seattle Kraken will for Shane Wright, remains to be determined.

Savoie’s Jan. 1, 2004 birthday means he starts the season in his 19-year-old year and thus ineligible for the AHL, but had he been born Dec. 31, 2003, it’d be his 20-year-old season and there’d be no arguments to be had. It’s frustrating to say the least because there’s not much more for Savoie to accomplish in the WHL apart from winning a WHL title and the Memorial Cup.

As for the World Juniors, Savoie was frustrated by Canada not selecting him for last year’s team despite being one of the top junior players.

Savoie’s injury is a real tough blow for a guy who was showing a lot of the reasons why he may have been ready for the NHL this season. But with all the possibilities still on the table for him once he’s recovered, the organization hasn’t had a conundrum like this since Mikhail Grigorenko’s development was stunted by Darcy Regier and Tim Murray a decade ago (Yes, it’s been that long. Yes, we’re all that old now. Yes, it hurts to write ALL of that).

Fortunately, there’s little stress to force Savoie to the NHL right away because this Sabres team is properly deep which the post-lockout of 2012 and 2013-2014 Sabres were not.

Savoie aside, it’s very difficult to look past the maturity in Rousek’s game as well as the growth Kulich and Rosén have made since training camp a year ago.

Rousek could be the player with the most inside line to make the roster because of his age and experience and the fact he got the call last season when injury opened a spot in the lineup. Rousek has been a solid citizen and a good player capable of adapting to the role they need him to play. With that in mind, it makes him an ideal guy to slot into the lineup who can both be defensively responsible and contribute offensively as well.

What we saw from Rosén during the Prospects Challenge was very impressive. Strong two-way play, excellent playmaking, smart passes and play making, and being in the right spot to score goals and generate chances. The resilience he had throughout the Calder Cup Playoffs was impressive and he’s a little bigger and stronger than he was last season already.

The hype on Kulich is already fever pitched. The goal scoring from a year ago built the fire and he scored in both games of the Prospects Challenge. Expectations for him are sky-high to be part of the Sabres right away. Those feelings need to be tempered, however, as the rest of his game still needs a little bit of work.

Kulich’s offensive instincts are outstanding, however, and without Quinn to start the season and likely without Savoie to compete against in camp, the path to starting the season in Buffalo couldn’t be clearer. All it will take is a couple of preseason highlight reel goals to make the fans call for him even louder and considering how out of favor Olofsson is with the fan base at the moment, that Kulich’s skills are similar and he’s younger…it makes him even easier for fans to root for.

As for Olofsson, yes, his spot on the team is secure. He’s a veteran making $4.75 million against the cap. He’ll be on the Sabres roster assuredly unless he’s traded or injured and he’ll most likely be in the lineup as well. The coaching staff knows how best to use him if he’s in the lineup (Evolving Hockey), but everyone comes into camp with a clean slate of sorts. The spot on the team is there for him, but the ice time will need to be won.

How they’ll set the lines will be interesting to see without Quinn because that’s a key spot on the right wing on the second line up for grabs.

DEFENSE

Rasmus Dahlin

Owen Power

Mattias Samuelsson

Henri Jokiharju

Erik Johnson

Connor Clifton

Jacob Bryson

Riley Stillman

Kale Clague

Ryan Johnson

The Sabres top-six on defense is seemingly set. They’ve got three lefthanded shots and three righthanded shots but whether Granato will split the six of them up according to handedness or if he’ll stick to what worked last season.

Advanced stats didn’t exactly smile upon the Dahlin-Samuelsson pairing, but they also played all of the hardest matchups and had the ice in every desperate moment to hold a lead late in games. They were the Sabres best pairing, until you dig deeper into the fancy stats and find out that Dahlin and Jokiharju were much better than Dahlin was with Samuelsson.

If Dahlin and Samuelsson are split up, the possibility of all three pairs having a lefty-righty split jumps dramatically but opens up the question of who plays with who. Fortunately, they’ve got a few weeks to work that out.

After signing Erik Johnson and Connor Clifton, the competition on the blue line is really for who slots into the No. 7 and possibly No. 8 spot in support. Teams don’t sign a longtime veteran and a younger veteran for three seasons to have them sit out or fight for a job.

After Buffalo traded Ilya Lyubushkin to Anaheim, the blue line picture cleared up quite a bit because if they keep eight, it’s a three-way battle between Bryson, Stillman, and Clague where two will stay and the third goes to waivers to ideally play in Rochester. If they opt to keep seven defensemen to allow them to keep two extra forwards or three goalies, however, the competition will be fierce.

Bryson is coming off a down season and Stillman was a player they went out and acquired ahead of the trade deadline last season. Clague, meanwhile, was meant to play in Rochester last season, but early season injuries got him to Buffalo, and his play kept him there whether it was in the lineup or as a depth player.

Johnson’s name was included as part of the competition here because of his age and experience after graduating from Minnesota and signing late last season. He also looked very good during the Prospects Challenge and showed all the signs you want to see from a more mature player and then some.

Johnson is almost assuredly ticketed for the AHL because he needs those pro games to get acclimated, but he plays smart, he plays quick, and he makes the right plays in his own end. As Americans coach Seth Appert told us at the conclusion of the Prospects Challenge, it will be Johnson’s defensive play that will carry him forward even though he can do all the other things offensively.

Bryson would seemingly have an edge based on cumulative performance, but he’ll have to show last season’s tough showing was an outlier. Stillman performed well on the third pairing late in the season and Clague had moments where he played very well. Nothing will be given here; it’ll all be earned.

GOALTENDING

Devon Levi

Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen

Eric Comrie

Dustin Tokarski

Devin Cooley

Michael Houser

Scott Ratzlaff

In theory, the battle for Sabres goaltending is open, but when you break it down practically, the competition is all but closed.

Rookie Devon Levi is the presumptive No. 1 after he nearly led the Sabres to the playoffs upon signing out of Northeastern last season. He played extremely well, he was fun to watch, and he came up big in the moments they most needed a goalie to make key saves. The three-goalie attack of Luukkonen, Comrie, and Craig Anderson weren’t able to do that with regularity which opened the door for Levi to walk in and seize the starter’s net fresh out of college.

The only way Levi doesn’t come away with a spot in the NHL is if he has an all-time terrible preseason. Unfortunately, we’ve seen that happen in recent memory when Luukkonen had an NHL spot there for the taking in training camp in 2021 but performed so poorly, he was sent to Rochester and Tokarski beat him and Aaron Dell out for the backup job behind Anderson. It is ironic that Tokarski is back with the Sabres once again and, once again, presumed set to head to the AHL to help give the Americans superb depth in the AHL.

It’ll be worth it to see how goaltending minutes are broken down in the first week of the preseason with five games in seven days. We listed all seven goalies in Sabres camp because there’s a possibility we might see all of them for some minutes during that week.

We’re getting away from the focus here though. Levi and Luukkonen are the odds-on favorites for Buffalo because Levi is the future and, frankly, so is Luukkonen. The catch now is that Luukkonen would need to go through waivers to go to Rochester and there’s virtually zero chance of that happening because another team would absolutely grab him. If Luukkonen is outplayed by Comrie (or Tokarski or Cooley or Houser), it’s far more likely a trade would be worked out.

The possibility of Comrie going on waivers before the season would seem high, and if he plays well enough a trade also would make sense rather than to lose him for nothing. The Sabres are prepared to lose a goalie, however. With Tokarski, Cooley, and Houser penciled in for Rochester right now, sending Comrie down would then likely get Houser to Jacksonville in the ECHL (the Sabres new affiliate).

If Comrie plays so well he stakes a claim for more games and minutes in the NHL, there’s still the outside chances the Sabres keep three goalies on the roster. That would be a last resort kind of situation, however, because it doesn’t allow any one goalie to get in a rhythm and if one goalie does get the bulk of the starts, then the other two are fighting for games and neither of them is game-fresh to start. They did it last season out of necessity because 41-year-old Anderson wasn’t able to be game-ready because of recovery and then guys struggled to seize the net for large chunks of the schedule outside of Luukkonen in November and December.

Going with three goalies would cause issues elsewhere on the roster, however, because then it would leave two roster spots open for extra skaters at forward and defense and that’s not an ideal situation either, particularly when the schedule gets busier and the bumps and bruises pile up. It’s maybe less of a worry for forwards since so many of them have waiver eligibility, but that’s not the case on defense. It’s very difficult to see them going with a three-goalie rotation again, but now that we’ve seen it happen before, it has to be in the back of our minds as a desperate possibility.

Ratzlaff is listed here, but the 18-year-old will head back to Seattle in the WHL where he’ll continue to develop and should see more action this season unless Thomas Milic returns as an overage player.

This is going to be a wildly exciting season and with camp underway it’s just the first step. Camp is going to fly by. They open on Thursday, and they’ll play their first preseason game Sunday afternoon in Washington (an odd coincidence that the Bills will be at FedEx Field the same day). Then they’ll have a packed week with games and practices, and we likely won’t see too many cuts made until the following week after they play their final two preseason games against Pittsburgh and Columbus.

The hype is real, and the competition is very much alive, even if it does look like most of the roster is spoken for.