The Buffalo Sabres are in Anaheim tonight for a 10 pm puck drop and will look to get on the right side of the win-loss column after two dud performances against Los Angeles and Calgary.
If there’s such a thing as a must-win February hockey game, this is it. Anaheim is very much a beatable team without much to play for the rest of the season as they sit at 17-31-6. The Sabres on the other hand have a lot to play for tonight considering they’re still 6 points back of Washington for the final wildcard spot with four games in hand over the Caps.
Even though the mini bye and the two post-bye losses have really taken the wind out of the Sabres sails as the calendar inches towards March, the team still has an excellent shot to get back in the thick of the race with a win tonight.
Per Sabres.com, coach Don Granato has reshuffled the reshuffled deck that he shuffled on Monday. Here are the forward lines as of today:
Skinner-Thompson-Tuch
Peterka-Cozens-Olofsson
Mittelstadt-Krebs-Quinn
Girgensons-Jost-Okposo
Putting the top line back together is a good move. They just work better together. It’s also good to see Peyton Krebs get a bit of a bump from the 4th line grinder duties that he’s been pressed into for much of the last month. There’s still more offensive upside to him if he’s given the right linemates and opportunity.
As previously mentioned, the Ducks are in selling mode and it’s believed they’re entertaining offers of veteran center Adam Henrique. The Brantford, Ontario native is having a pretty solid offensive campaign this season with 19 goals and 14 assists while playing on a contract that has one more year left at an average annual value of $5.825m, according to CapFriendly.
His was a popular mock trade name for Sabres fans in the years following the Ryan O’Reilly trade when the Sabres were wandering the 2C wilderness. The Sabres are in a position now where his name likely doesn’t make much sense due to the presence of Thompson, Cozens and even Krebs.
There’s another name here that is interesting, though: Max Comtois. The 2017 2nd round pick (who was also speculated to potentially be a piece of a Jack Eichel trade) looked primed for a breakout following an excellent Covid-shortened 2020-21 season when he potted 16 goals and 17 assists in 55 games. That has turned out to be the high-water mark for him since; he tallied 16 points in 52 games last year and has 9 points in 42 this year.
He played 15:28 ATOI during that banner year and has now seen his time on ice dragged down below 14 minutes, according to hockey reference. In a case of the eye test matching the counting stats matching the fancy stats, he had really positive offensive results analytically during the 20-21 campaign, as shown by his player card.
His shooting percentage has also cratered the past two years, and while he shot above 15% each of his first three seasons, he has hovered around 8% this year and last. So while there’s no official word that the pending RFA is on the trade block, all of this reads like a guy who desperately needs a change of scenery to get his scoring confidence back up. The 6’2” Quebec native also brings some size and physicality.
If the Ducks do indeed move on from Henrique then they’ll likely want to start thinking about their center depth long-term. This is where the Sabres and Casey Mittelstadt could be a good fit. Mittelstadt will likely never be a top-9 center for the Sabres when we consider not only Thompson, Cozens and Krebs as key center cogs for now, but also because Matt Savoie and Jiri Kulich could figure into that conversation sooner rather than later.
Mittelstadt would likely get a much better shot at his natural position on a Ducks team that is looking to move Henrique. With 31 points in 52 games, Mittelstadt would be 4th on the Ducks in scoring if he were traded today.
In Buffalo, Comtois would likely get more ice time as well as the opportunity to play with Dylan Cozens, while Don Granato would be tasked with restoring confidence for the big winger.
The bigger picture tonight, of course, is the two points on the table for the Sabres. Still, it’s fun to think about the approaching trade deadline and what the Sabres could do to alter and strengthen their roster for a potential playoff push.
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