@boosbuzzsabres
On the heels of another injury to yet another Sabres forward, Buffalo bench boss Ralph Krueger was pretty matter of fact yesterday while talking about what's happening up-front. "It was a really long stretch with the same forward lines, and there was some good synergy there," he said to the media at yesterday's practice. "The process seemed to be quite automatic, especially the way we want to be connected on the ice. Losing a forward a game now for five games in a row has been quite disruptive."
The latest casualty was winger Tage Thompson, who suffered what looked to be a shoulder injury in the 4-1 loss at the Chicago Blackhawks. Thompson joined Vladimir Sobotka, Marcus Johansson, Johan Larsson, and Kyle Okposo in the ranks of injured forwards and is expected to be out 3-5 weeks. Sobotka's looks to be out some 3-5 weeks more weeks recovering from his lower body injury and Okposo is out indefinitely with a concussion. Johansson and Larsson are listed as day-to-day, but won't play tonight against the Minnesota Wild.
As we dig deeper into the hockey department, the Rochester Americans haven't fared all that much better on the injury front. The Sabres had already called up Curtis Lazar, Rasmus Asplund and Thompson which depleted the Amerks forward ranks, and on the injury report released yesterday three Rochester forwards under contract with the Sabres were on that list--Scott Wilson, C.J. Smith and Remi Elie. That leaves only two forwards--Jean Sebastian Dea and Andrew Oglevie--under contract with Buffalo and eligible to be called up.
It should be said that the Sabres enjoyed a seamless transition with Lazar and Asplund as both looked like they belonged which might lead one to believe that either Dea or Oglevie would fit right in as well. However, none of that group were or are expected to have an impact on secondary scoring, something of which the Sabres desperately need right now.
Buffalo general manager Jason Botterill is in Toronto for the annual GM meetings and Lord knows there will be conversations with him, especially in light of these recent injuries and with the full knowledge that he has a glut of NHL defensemen at his disposal. Word on the street all off season is that Botterill was looking for some top-six forward help and it would seem as if that's still true. Minnesota might be a fine trade-partner as they're last in the league and it looks as if they're rebuilding. There are others but leaks from the Botterill camp have been few and far between during his three years as Buffalo's GM.
In any event, that's looking a bit forward but for now we'll continue on by looking back at the last five games which conveniently ties in with the beginning of the Sabres injury woes up-front.
Tampa Bay Lightning-3 Buffalo-2
This would be the first of a back-to-back between the two clubs as part of the NHL's 2019 Global Series held in Stockholm, Sweden. The Sabres had five players from Sweden in the lineup--G, Linus Ullmark and defenseman Rasmus Dahlin plus forwards Marcus Johansson, Johan Larsson and Victor Olofsson--and a sixth, defenseman Lawrence Pilut, was recalled from Rochester to make the trip but did not play. Forward Sam Reinhart scored both Buffalo's goals and the game was marred by a dirty hit on Sobotka from Tampa forward Nikita Kucherov, who submarined Sobotka well after he got rid of the puck. There was no penalty called on the play (and the NHL didn't even review the hit after the Series.) Buffalo was down 1-0 at the time (on a Kucherov goal, no-less) and eventually found themselves in a 2-0 hole after the Lightning scored on a powerplay late in the period. One final note, Kucherov was named the game's No. 1 star.
Buffalo-3 Tampa Bay-5
In the rematch the following night, Reinhart lit the lamp to give the Sabres a 1-0 lead and the Lightning would score three unanswered goals before Olofsson made it 3-2 on a determined individual effort that netted him the first even-strength goal of his young NHL career. Tampa would tack on two more goals before Jack Eichel scored with :38 seconds left in the game for the final score. Johansson skated 19:46 in the game and registered an assist but somewhere along the line he tweaked something and was placed on injured reserve November 14 with an upper-body injury.
Carolina Hurricanes-5 Buffalo-4 OT
The entire Stockholm experience took 11 days and it set up what Krueger called, "21 games to Christmas," a stretch where his Sabres would play a compact schedule over 37 days up to the Christmas break. The first game of that stretch was against a Carolina Hurricanes team that had swept the season series against the Sabres three years running. Jeff Skinner opened the scoring for Buffalo against his former team with his eighth goal of the season. Skinner loves playing against the 'Canes as he's tallied five goals in four games against the club that traded him to Buffalo. Carolina scored three unanswered goals before Curtis Lazar scored his first goal in his first recall as a Buffalo Sabre. The Sabres were down by a goal late in the game but Larsson became an unlikely hero as a Skinner shot deflected off of him as he was being abused in the crease. In overtime the Sabres had a mix up in D-zone coverage and Carolina once again left the ice with a win over Buffalo. Larsson suffered an upper-body injury in the game and was declared day-to-day.
Ottawa Senators-2 Buffalo-4
What can you say about Eichel? When he bears down and decides to unleash his full potential, he's almost impossible to contain. Eichel scored all four goals in the Sabres victory and single-handedly ended Buffalo's six-game winless streak. He scored on a snapper from the right circle off the rush, scored from the slot off the rush and he scored from the left circle off a drag to towards the slot. He even added an empty-netter with authority from the red line. This was Jack's game, however there were other notable moments. Asplund made his NHL debut in the game and looked exceptional while logging over 12 minutes of ice time and was 5/9 (56%) on faceoffs. After two periods of generally looking lost, Krueger benched Dahlin for the entire third period with Eichel giving him a pep talk at one point. On the injury front, Kyle Okposo was felled during a line change from a hit that looked somewhat innocent. Unfortunately the point of contact was his head and he suffered a concussion. Okposo's hockey future is at stake here as he's had multiple concussions including a scary incident surrounding one that had him in intensive care and in a dark place.
Buffalo-1 Chicago Blackhawks-4
With Sobotka, Johansson, Larsson and now Okposo out, Tage Thompson got the call to Buffalo joining Evan Rodrigues, Lazar and Asplund as replacements for the fallen. The Sabres hit the United Center ice with a dismal 1-6-3 record in their last 10 games in Chicago and they fell 4-1. Buffalo has not won there since January, 2007. Eichel was victimized by 18 yr. old rookie Kirby Dach on the first two goals, Chicago's Patrick Kane made it 3-0 early in the third period and fellow future Hall of Famer Jonathan Toews scored the Hawks fourth goal before Eichel broke the shutout. Overall it was one of the ugliest games many in Sabreland had the displeasure of watching as their Sabres fell to 2-6-2 in their last 10 games after starting the season 8-1-1.
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Some quick lineup notes on tonight's matchup vs. the Wild, according to reports from the rink the Sabres won't be making the call to Rochester and will be going with 11 forwards and seven defensemen. John Gilmour, who hasn't played since Brandon Montour returned from injury in early November, will be in the lineup playing forward, something he hasn't done since midget hockey. Also, Marco Scandella gets a spot in the press box while Colin Miller is back on defense after being a healthy scratch the last three games, all of which coincided with Scandella's return from injury.
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