The Sabres bum-rushed the Red Wings with a four-goal first period en route to a 7-3 win to kick off the biggest week of their season.
BUFFALO — A funny thing happened to the Buffalo Sabres on the way to playing out the string: they wound up creeping their way back into the discussion for the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
The Sabres sat seven points out of the second wild card to start the week and with three games against teams right in front of them in said race, they found themselves in position to officially make things interesting as the season ticks down. All they have to do is beat the Detroit Red Wings twice and the New York Islanders in between those two matchups.
The Sabres got part one taken care of at KeyBank Center on Tuesday night in a 7-3 romp against the Red Wings. They blitzed out to a 4-1 lead after the first period and held a 7-2 advantage after two.
They’re not in it, not yet, but they’re creeping into the discussion by earning points one way or another regularly.
“(We’re) not thinking about that,” Alex Tuch said. “Honestly, just going out and playing, just shift by shift, coming in, working every day. We’re a really young team and we’re going to continue to try to get better individually and as a team.”
Not thinking about the possibility is probably the best thing for this group after they’ve felt the weight of expectations since the start of training camp. Yes, that’s our fault for asking about it so regularly, but after finishing one point behind the Florida Panthers for the second wild card last year, this was just the natural course of progression.
More ahead…
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The Sabres are 8-4-1 in their past 12 games, 6-3-1 in the past 10 and winners of two in row against Edmonton and Detroit. The loss for the Red Wings was their sixth straight and they’re without Dylan Larkin for a couple weeks now. While they’re just trying to hang on and fend off the Islanders and Lightning (and potentially the Flyers) in the wild card race, their slide opened the door for the Islanders to overtake them in the standings and for teams like Washington, Buffalo, and New Jersey to keep their own dreams of the playoffs alive.
For Buffalo, it’s less about playoff talk than it is about getting their game right, at last.
“I think it’s a progression for the group,” Sabres coach Don Granato said. “Not only have you seen the pace, but you know I’ve mentioned it many times to this group, ‘That stuff’s going to come back, it’s going to come back.’
“There’s some things that we’ve worked on and turned our attention to that need to become second nature, and as they’ve become second nature and you’re not turning conscious thought to some of those things – what I’m speaking of primarily is defending and defending the right way – and you can put that in the subconscious level and you develop that skill, the other stuff tends to come back. It’s still a work in progress, I’ll tell you that. But tonight was a good night.”
Calling it a good night is keeping it low-key. The Sabres attacked the Red Wings with speed and counter-attacked them at will as Detroit was sloppy with the puck and was guilty of watching the puck more than they were playing their system, especially in the opening 20 minutes. It didn’t help that Alex Lyon, who’s been brilliant for Detroit this season, had a poor showing and was chased after allowing four goals on 13 shots in under 16 minutes.
The Red Wings were also back on the east coast after playing the previous three games in Colorado, Arizona, and Vegas.
That was a recipe to get blown out and Detroit was.
“We knew that they were coming back from a west coast road trip and had a tough travel day yesterday,” Tuch said. “It’s just, we’ve been in their shoes, been in their position where when you come back from the road, come back east it’s really hard to get your legs back under you and adjust to the time change. So we wanted to start hard and fast and we were able to do so tonight.”
It all started with Tuch taking advantage of a neutral zone turnover and blowing past Detroit defenseman Ben Chiarot on the way to the net to beat Lyon. The Sabres nearly made it 2-0 moments later when Tyson Jost put home a puck after Eric Robinson drove the net, but the play was challenged by Detroit coach Derek Lalonde and was found to be very distinctly offside.
It was no matter, however, as they made it 2-0 soon enough when Bo Byram scored off a Zach Benson rebound midway through the period. That was followed minutes later by Chiarot beating Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen to cut it to 2-1. But 23 seconds later, Benson’s one-timer on a pass from Jordan Greenway beat Lyon to restore the two-goal lead. Jeff Skinner made it 4-1 2:29 after that when Benson found him streaking into the zone off a line change. That goal ended Lyon’s night and got Buffalo out in front enough to not have to sweat out the rest of the game.
Tage Thompson set up the Sabres next two goals in the second period: a one-timer by Connor Clifton and Byram’s second of the game on a rebound in front of the net that made it 6-1. Lucas Raymond scored on the power play to cut the Sabres lead to 6-2, but JJ Peterka wired one head-high and over the glove of James Reimer to make it 7-2. Jake Walman’s third period goal provided the final score and little else for a Red Wings team that’s really fighting it during this six-game slide. Had they not won the previous six games in a row before this, things would be even more dire.
Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?
Seeing Detroit fight it looked a lot like what we’ve seen from Buffalo throughout the season, granted the Sabres haven’t had an extended losing streak like that all year. Buffalo’s been a comfortably average-to-below-average team most of the season. Now they’re looking more average-to-above-average with far more regularity and they’re feeding off the highs rather than drowning in the lows.
“I’ve mentioned it since the New Year, how much better this group is from a psychological standpoint and moving forward day by day, progressing,” Granato said. “That’s the big one for me. They’re showing – I see it because I’m the one asking them and demanding – and then you see it in film, you see it every night when you play. Different things are getting better, and the hope is that collectively they come together sooner than later.”
Granato pressed this for them all season. About getting good habits, about doing things right, about playing with pace. I know everyone got tired of hearing about that while they were winning one and losing two on-and-off for a few months. And I’m not here to crown him either. The team got into a monster hole for an assortment of reasons, and he’s got a hand in that too, but, we’ve started to see the fruits of that labor appear over the last month or two and that’s noticeable and it’s something that’s gotten through to the players.
“We’re in the mindset of trying to play the right way each and every shift, each individual guy has to play the right way or… you’re not going to play, and so you have to continue to push and press, try to kind of push each other and push yourself individually,” Tuch said. “Tonight, we had all 20 guys going, and it was great to see.”
It’s one win this week and they’re going to need two more. That’s a lot of pressure, but they’ve been seemingly out of the picture long enough that they’re almost playing with house money. If they lose, everyone was expecting it to happen anyway. Same ole’ Sabres, right?
But if they win, and continue to do so, and whittle down the distance to the second wild card a little more each game…
Funnier things have happened.