The past three games have been… well, they’ve been something that’s for sure.
Let’s start with a mea culpa from last week.
The Buffalo Sabres 5-2 loss at home to the Pittsburgh Penguins had me on game story duty for the Associated Press and you might remember that one as being the game where Penguins goalie Alex Nedeljkovic made 40 saves and became the first goalie in NHL history to have a goal and an assist in a game.
Covering a team that plays the role being on the flipside of a historic moment meant they had to take a backseat that night with both a game and Nedeljkovic’s moment to write about. The Sabres made it easy to not focus on them that night getting down 4-1 at one point and got thoroughly outdone by the Penguins’ goalie. Sure, they kept Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin off the board, but at the cost of being a footnote to history.
“That’s so Sabres…”
That game is old news, however, and with the team out west it’s time to take stock of more recent happenings. Let’s dig in.
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Kraken 6 — Sabres 4
Something that was sort of lost in the game against Pittsburgh was goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen taking an accidental shot to the head from Evgeni Malkin when he crashed the net late in the second period. That incident led to Luukkonen not totally feeling right when the team geared up to face Seattle a few days later and in turn earned Devon Levi a cross-country flight to start against the Kraken.
These starts for Levi are precious and offer him the chance to show that the outstanding play he’s had all season in Rochester is serving him well. Unfortunately, this start against Seattle proved to be a bit more testing. It’s not entirely fair to ask a guy who flew across the country to be at his best, but they’re professionals and that means having to be ready for anything at any time, even after just recently turning 23 years old.
Levi was active to the point of being too busy and kicked out a lot of rebounds. The Kraken crashed the net and had a lot of guys around the net throughout the game without much resistance from the Sabres defenders. That didn’t help Levi out, but Levi didn’t help himself too much either. A perfect storm towards giving up six goals for the second time to a team that’s struggled to score goals all season.
Jack Quinn, Jason Zucker, Tage Thompson, and Alex Tuch all had goals in the loss and Levi had 28 saves in 33 shots.
Luukkonen not being right opened the door for Levi to get the start, but I’m left wondering about James Reimer. If the choice is to go with the young guy because you want to get a look at him, OK, but if a veteran like Reimer isn’t getting the call in what would be an obvious situation for the backup to play in… why is Reimer the backup in the first place? His last appearance was also his last start Jan. 4 in Vegas and he’s 1-5-1 with a .891 save percentage. They don’t want Levi backing up in Buffalo because he needs to play, but running Luukkonen into the ground probably also wasn’t in the strategy either.
After the game, Ruff appeared to be beside himself with the effort the team put in. He called out their lack of ability to win battles, to be physical and even called out their conditioning. I’ve always said that when a coach calls his team “soft” that it’s all over and it’s time to start scouting for a new one. This was Ruff’s way of calling them that without saying the word and, hey, sometimes semantics provides the right path to a response.
How they responded to that was the most interesting non-Canucks thing to watch during Tuesday’s game.
Sabres 3 — Canucks 2
After hearing Ruff call the team out and be critical of how not physical they played against Seattle and put their conditioning into question (a fascinating choice because a coach has a lot to say about that), that he also held a morning skate during the second game of a back-to-back wasn’t entirely surprising. That move put a lot on the line for himself and the players.
If they looked lethargic and got their doors blown off, it would’ve had the double-whammy effect of making Ruff look foolish and somewhat confirmed the criticisms he levied against them the night before. But if they committed to playing more to how he wanted and “did things the right way” then it had the chance of becoming a sort of buy-in moment for what he’s preached.
The challenge was set, accepted, and ultimately accomplished as the Sabres pulled out a 3-2 win against a Vancouver team that’s on the precipice of being blown up.
The fascinating part of seeing teams run into others that are going through it is the off chance they run into another version of themselves. On Tuesday night, the Sabres faced off against a Canucks team that played very much like how the Sabres performed the day before in Seattle. The Canucks were not physical, lost battles all over the ice, and in the third period were dominated by the Sabres competitively. Even with all the talent Vancouver has in Elias Pettersson, Quinn Hughes, Brock Boeser, Thatcher Demko and J.T. Miller they just didn’t have it at all in the final 20 minutes as the Sabres came back from being down 2-1 after two periods.
It was like the Sabres passed themselves going up a down staircase and were led out by Luukkonen who returned to the net and played brilliant hockey after having a few days off. Rest can do wonders and it sure looked like it did for him.
Then there was Jiri Kulich.
Kulich had a goal and two assists. His goal in the third period came on a play where J-J Peterka took initiative and attacked the Vancouver net. His shot put the pressure on their defense and Kulich’s presence of mind to just go to the front of the net was what Peterka saw to dish it to him.
Kulich’s two assists came from faceoff wins. Tage Thompson’s goal in the first period came directly from Kulich’s win on the draw. Thompson wanted to shoot right away but had Canucks bodies in front of him, so he swung out wide and let a shot go when he saw an opening. Easy does it.
Kulich’s third period faceoff win came minutes after he scored to tie it. He won the puck back to Rasmus Dahlin who made a slick pass to Peterka who didn’t hesitate to shoot and beat Demko for the lead.
It was another grown-up kind of game for Kulich and another three-point game for him. While many other Sabres forwards’ willingness to shoot or push the pace of the offense has gone in waves, since returning from injury, Kulich has been relatively steady and earnest in how he’s trying to generate chances. This kind of growth is good to see, obviously, and it’s the kind of play that you hope to see inspire others to attack the game with the same kind of fervor with their own styles.
There are already some fans eager to see Kulich locked into a top six role based on his recent play and it’s understandable. Dylan Cozens has struggled, and Tage Thompson was moved to wing because he’s been unable to take draws because of something (or things) that are making it hard for him to do. There’s not much appetite for Peyton Krebs to center the top six, but he’s been in a good place on a line with Zach Benson and Jack Quinn.
Even still, Kulich playing center comes with some level of question because he has the shot and build of a classic winger, but the organization top to bottom has been adamant about making sure he can get it done up the middle and that’s paying off given how he’s been successful enough at draws and his desire to push the puck up the ice and create offense are resulting in more quality chances. When you consider the Sabres are still at the bottom of the Eastern Conference and 11 points out of the second wild card spot, these are the long-term wins you want to see happen in player growth.
Yes, it’s incredible to be talking like that again with 35 games left to play and we’re not even out of January. Something, something meaningful games in March something. Realize that it’s still the Eastern Conference and no team is actually in a set spot nor terribly good in the wild card race, but we’ve started to see some separation higher in the standings and the Sabres separated themselves from that group about a month ago.
The win over Vancouver was their seventh win in the past 26 games (7-15-4), a span that began with the 13-game losing streak. The Sabres live in duality and right now part of that duality is a season-defining streak that crippled their playoff hopes.