Mike Harrington: It's wheels up for Sabres as Buffalo camp ends and European journey begins
The Buffalo portion of training camp is over. A week that went by in a flash. Now it's on to team-bonding and what will be the longest road trip of the entire season. The Sabres won't be back in town until Oct. 6.
Bon voyage, boys.
The equipment bags were being packed in the Buffalo Sabres’ dressing room and all kinds of boxes of, well, stuff were in full view in the adjacent hallway Tuesday afternoon in KeyBank Center. The place was a beehive of activity.
The Sabres’ NHL season doesn’t start for more than a week but they were scheduled to be in wheels-up mode late Tuesday night for Munich to continue training camp, play an exhibition game on Friday – and probably attend an Oktoberfest session or two. Then it’s off to Prague for their pair of NHL Global Series games in Czechia against the New Jersey Devils on Oct. 4-5.
Sabres defenseman Rasmus Dahlin, middle, skates during a drill against wingers Jack Quinn, left, and Jordan Greenway during practice on Tuesday. Joshua Bessex, Buffalo News
Meanwhile, prospects and players expected to be in Rochester headed to Pittsburgh for an exhibition game against the Penguins and will do likewise for games in Columbus and Ottawa later this week. The kids will be around some and will play in a “Semi-Sabres” game here Monday against Detroit.
But in reality, the Buffalo portion of training camp is over. A week that went by in a flash.
Now it’s on to team-bonding and what will be the longest road trip of the entire season. The Sabres – the real ones – won’t be back in town until Oct. 6.
“We’ve got to make sure we get something out of it every day,” said coach Lindy Ruff. “It’s great to be together because when you’re at home for a training camp, after the day’s done, you’re on your own and you go your own way. Now being together, we’re going to fly together, practice, we’ll be in the hotel together. Meals will be together. There’s a lot of really positive about being together for a period of time.”
Ruff recalled the Sabres’ 2011 trip to Mannheim and Berlin, Germany, and Helsinki, Finland, as being a positive experience. And don’t forget it featured wins over Anaheim and Los Angeles as part of a 5-1 start.
“What a great trip that was,” Ruff said. “You get to know your players. They get to know us. Each day when you practice, you’re trying to work on something that gets you better.”
There was plenty of housekeeping to take care of Tuesday. The most important item was the return to practice of Rasmus Dahlin – dare we say impending captain Rasmus Dahlin? – after he tweaked something in the first few minutes last Wednesday.
Dahlin was wearing a gold noncontact sweater but he took some bumps. He looked fine. He skated with regular defense partner Henri Jokiharju and, notably, was in his normal spot on the power play.
No question the Sabres want him to get some action in Friday’s exhibition against vs. Red Bull Munich so that the season opener isn’t his first glimpse of game action since he played for Sweden in the World Championships in May, also in Prague.
“You haven’t practiced with a team for a while, and you kind of have been on the outside looking in,” Dahlin said. “It’s not so much fun. So I was excited today again, and it was a good practice. I had to work. It was great.”
Ruff revealed that Czechia natives Jiri Kulich and Lukas Rousek will make the trip with defenseman Kale Clague and goalie James Reimer. They essentially will be a four-man taxi squad in case they are needed, as the Sabres and Devils are allowed to bring 27 players.
There’s some curiosity to Friday’s game in part because it’s the grand opening of a new arena in Munich, the SAP Garden. A German team playing a visiting NHL squad normally would create a good atmosphere, but this might be a supercharged one.
And Ruff revealed, the ice surface is actually going to be a tad wider at 93 feet, compared with the NHL standard of 85 feet. So there will be some unique challenges to the game.
“The main point will be trying to play between the (faceoff) dots,” Ruff said. “We’ll have a little bit extra ice. ... I think on European ice you have a tendency to get on the outside and we’ve been harping stay on the inside. I’ve already offered up this morning that we’ve got to just concentrate on playing between the dots. That distance is the same and you’ve got to stay on the inside.”
Getting to the inside in front of the goal has been a big point of emphasis in this camp. The Sabres no longer can be a perimeter team. They have shown much more structure and purpose in this camp than we’ve seen in recent years. Five of their first six periods of exhibition games have been excellent. Other than Dahlin’s nick, they have had no injuries.
Sometime in the next week, you imagine Ruff would name Dahlin his captain. Just like he did with Jason Pominville 13 years ago during a team dinner in Helsinki. Dahlin said he hasn’t thought about the position but he clearly would embrace it.
“He wants this team to be a winner. He wants to be part of this team,” Ruff said. “I think sometimes it’s easy to say, ‘Well, I don’t want to be part of it anymore.’ He wants this group to be success, and he wants to be the guy who helps lead.”
“It’s going to be good,” Dahlin said of the trip. “We’re going to have a lot of fun, but also we’re going to be able to work really hard these next few days. A lot of people talk about having a good team-bonding trip, but it’s also about working hard.
“They’ve got great facilities over there. It’s a little bit bigger ice, so more skating. It’s a chance for us to get better and we’re going to have some fun obviously but we’re there to prepare for the season.”
So see ya, Blue and Gold. Bring us back a trinket or two from the other side of the pond.
Preferably two wins.