The Sabres rallied to a 3-2 win at home against the Pittsburgh Penguins after being down 2-0 after two periods, much in part due to the words and actions of Kyle Okposo.
BUFFALO — Friday’s game was a “put a star next to that one” effort for the Buffalo Sabres.
Buffalo’s offense has been struggling and the losses have mounted recently including a frustrating effort in Washington in which they gave up the tying goal late in the third and then lost with seconds left in overtime. The morale on the outside was low and the team has been frustrated about how difficult it’s been to score goals this season.
Friday night was looking to be yet another one of those kinds of games after the Pittsburgh Penguins got out to a 2-0 lead after two periods. The Sabres had opportunities through most of the first only to see shots go high and wide or had Pens starting goalie Alex Nedeljkovic bat them away.
It was five consecutive periods without a goal against the Penguins and the more veteran Pittsburgh squad used their senior wiles to make it all the more frustrating for the Sabres. The fans booed the team to the locker room and the stars were aligned for further angst. In the locker room after that second period, the mood changed thanks to captain Kyle Okposo.
“Okie said some things that I think everyone wanted to run through a brick wall after he spoke,” Alex Tuch said. “He’s the type of guy that, it doesn’t matter what he says, everyone in here is going to listen. He leads by example, has a big goal for us. It doesn’t matter whether he scored that goal or not, he was doing all the little things and he was working his ass off out there and that’s what he’s been doing.”
Jeff Skinner, Okposo, and Tuch each scored in the third to give the Sabres a 3-2 comeback win, the kind of win that if they’re able to take their collective game in a new, upward direction, will be one to remember.
“I felt our team was very competitively upset,” Sabres coach Don Granato said. “There’s other words to describe that. But they were not happy in a very competitive manner and were ready to take more initiative. I don’t think they were conscious that they hadn’t scored in (five) periods (against Pittsburgh). I think they were very conscience that they felt they should have scored already and were determined to score now. That was evident by the action in the third.”
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The uneasy foreboding that lingered in KeyBank Center after the first two periods was ominous. After all, there’s immense pressure from the outside for this team to get things right and return to the postseason.
Playing .500 hockey is good enough in the Eastern Conference to keep a team hanging around the playoff race, but there are a lot of teams in that group playing similarly inconsistent hockey and a short losing streak away from sitting near the bottom of the standings. The spot in the standings only serves to boldly highlight the up-and-down play and how those teams (Sabres and otherwise) should be doing much better than they are.
It’s easy to get riled up about a team being in 13th or 14th place but when it also comes with being three points out of a playoff position it’s a true test of optimism or pessimism. The glass half-full or half-empty test but it’s sports standings.
Okposo flipping the switch and firing up the team between periods makes for a great story because that’s the kind of player and person he is. He’s the leader, he’s the father figure, he’s the big brother…it’s what he’s meant to do when needed and it was certainly needed Friday.
“It was desperate,” Okposo said. “We just wanted to play our game. I talked about it before, we just haven’t played our game. It’s just pressure, pressure, pressure. Go, go, go. A lot of times when we do that, we stop thinking and a lot of goals end up on the highlight film. That what we had for a long time, but we haven’t really had that this year. I thought that we just did a really good of pressuring the puck and taking away their time and space and just attacking. Everybody wanted to attack, and that was our mantra going into the third and we did that.”
It’s one game but it stands out as one that could be a big one later on. Of course, the Sabres face the Devils and Rangers on the road in their next two games so the serotonin lift might be short-lived. But if what Okposo got into everyone’s heads for the final 20 minutes against Pittsburgh sticks and carries over, it would be nice for fans to have that as something to smile about and ask later on about why it didn’t happen sooner. Teams have to experience it at their own pace and after 19 games and 40 minutes, they decided enough was enough. If it doesn’t carry forward into upcoming games, this game will stand out in hindsight as the example of what they could be but can’t always achieve.
Other notes
— Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen was outstanding again. He allowed two goals and made 31 saves and played with the kind of cool to his game you usually see from the best veterans.
“Ukko was very, very good,” Granato said. “What I liked most about him being very good is his confidence. He looked extremely confident. I thought our defensemen did a nice job again on the backsides of him. He covered pucks in front of him and this is a team that scores a lot of backdoor goals and a lot of backdoor plays, I thought our defensemen were very good in that area around him and allowed him to focus on directly in front. You could see his confidence in knowing the sides are not something he needed to worry about. Great job by him and the whole group back there.”
Luukkonen playing like this is going to force the issue when it comes to how they dish out the starts. At some point the time to ride the hot hand will arise and Luukkonen is in front of both Eric Comrie and Devon Levi. I’d expect to see Comrie against New Jersey on Saturday since it’s his “turn” so to speak.
— Peyton Krebs played a great game and showed all facets of his game and what can make him a difference maker in the lineup.
Krebs drove the line with Okposo and Zemgus Girgensons until Girgensons left the game with a lower-body injury in the second period. Even after that, whoever else skated with him and Okposo benefited from having Krebs controlling the play.
We saw Krebs set up Okposo and Girgensons a few times early on with great passes for scoring chances. He played with competitive intensity throughout the game and it spilled over in a scuffle with Penguins defenseman Kris Letang. The two fell to the ice and Letang got in a couple shots down on the ice which incensed Krebs (rightfully so). He found ways to get under the Penguins skin all game long and he was a nightmare for them to deal with on the forecheck. It was an outstanding effort worthy of adulation.
“He cares so much, and he works so hard,” Tuch said about Krebs. “He helped us a lot tonight and I thought he had a really good game. And you know what, he’s going to keep getting better. He’s only 21, 22 years old and he’s got a long way to go, a long career ahead of him so it’s really good to see him be able to find his niche and find his ability to, you know what, maybe it’s not on the score sheet but say, ‘I’m going to find a way to make a difference in the game no matter what.’”
— The Sabres got the scoring started in the third with a power play goal from Skinner. A power play goal on its own is worth of recognition considering how erratic and poor the power play has been this year. But the power play performed markedly different against Pittsburgh. They were aggressive with the puck and moved it quickly to open up shooting opportunities.
“We got a big one on the power play tonight,” Granato said. “You mentioned attack. That is a mentality. We didn’t try to pass it in the net. We didn’t look for something pretty. Usually when you’re very, very intent and aggressive, it ends up being pretty anyway. That one certainly was.”
It wasn’t quite like a well-oiled machine, but it was the first game in a while where you watched how they performed and thought they were making good headway into improving things. What’s more is that they started the game with one set of units and Granato shuffled things around to try something else out by moving Victor Olofsson to the first unit and added Krebs to the second group. Turns out that was the right idea.