Sabres’ latest winless streak another bleak moment under Kevyn Adams: 4 thoughts
Thanksgiving is still almost two weeks away, and already the Sabres’ season looks lost.
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Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen stopped 27 of 30 shots he faced after coming in to replace Alex Lyon. Michael Martin / NHLI via Getty Images
The Buffalo Sabres’ 6-3 loss to the Colorado Avalanche on Thursday night wasn’t as ugly as the final score would indicate, but it’s tough for this team to take much solace in that.
Despite clawing back from an early 2-0 deficit and coming close to making it a 4-4 game late in regulation, the Sabres ultimately succumbed to the inevitable in falling to the first-place Avalanche. Whatever positives the Sabres can take from this game will be outweighed by the already grim outlook for their season.
Thanksgiving is still almost two weeks away, and already the Sabres’ season looks lost. They are now 0-4-1 in their last five games, 1-4-4 in their last nine and are the only team in the NHL that hasn’t won a road game. Their 5-8-4 record is the worst in the Eastern Conference and good for 30th in the NHL standings.
And it doesn’t look like it’s going to get better any time soon. The Sabres are without five of their regular forwards, along with their best defenseman and captain. Of those six players, none will be available when the Sabres travel to Detroit to finish this road trip against the Red Wings on Saturday. Zach Benson may return next week, but there’s no guarantee when any of the others will be back.
And the Sabres don’t have the luxury of time. Even fully healthy, there were questions about whether this lineup was good enough to play at the 95-point pace necessary to make the playoffs. With 14 points through 17 games, the Sabres now need to play at a 102-point pace the rest of the way just to hit 95 points. The Eastern Conference is wide open, but the Sabres have already lost ground.
“We’ve had some bad stuff happen to us, but we have to keep clawing,” Sabres coach Lindy Ruff told reporters after the loss to Colorado. “We have to win games. In every road game, we’ve been within a goal and haven’t pushed through yet.”
The failure to push through has defined this core for the last few years. After a 91-point season in 2022-23, the Sabres fell back to 84 points in 2023-24 and 79 points last season. At their current pace, they’ll take another step back this season. Already, the Sabres have lost at least three straight games on three separate occasions.
These types of stretches have been a constant during Kevyn Adams’ six seasons as the team’s general manager. The Sabres have now had a winless streak of at least five games in five of those seasons. Last season, a 13-game winless streak sank the Sabres’ season before the new year. If this slide gets anywhere close to that, the season will be sunk before the calendar flips to December.
And all that’s going to do is make the questions about this team’s future even louder. Chief among them: How long will owner Terry Pegula wait to make a meaningful change at the top of his hockey operations department?
Quick hits
1. Ruff moved Tage Thompson back to center in this game, and Thompson said he felt “like myself.” He likes being able to control the game and get his legs moving more. He also likes the shooting lanes he gets from that spot on the ice. Thompson wasn’t dominant, but he did score on the power play, added an assist and led the Sabres with five shots on net. This was a bounce-back game for the team’s first line after an ugly night for that group in Utah.Given how dire the Sabres’ situation is at center, keeping Thompson in the middle might be the right move. Josh Norris and Jiri Kulich aren’t returning any time soon, and having Thompson at the top of the center depth chart makes it more palatable.
2. After two quick Colorado goals on three shots, Ruff pulled Alex Lyon and replaced him with Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen. Ruff said it had nothing to do with Lyon, who didn’t have much of a chance on the two goals. He wanted to wake the team up and have some extra time on the bench to deliver a message. Luukkonen stopped 27 of the 30 shots he faced in relief, but the eventual game-winning goal was one he could have had. Gavin Brindley snapped a clean shot on the rush. It deflected off Owen Power’s stick, but Luukkonen had a look at it and could have made the save. He’s been beaten by similar goals this season.
3. The Sabres allowed their eighth empty net goal of the season and still haven’t scored while at six-on-five this season. The late-game situational hockey has been rough, and this one fell apart due to lousy luck. Rosen’s stick broke while he was attempting to get the puck into the zone, giving the Avalanche a scoring chance the other way.
4. The Sabres are now 0-10-2 without captain Rasmus Dahlin over the last two seasons. This blue line is deeper than it has been, but Dahlin still does a lot of heavy lifting for this team. Owen-Power and Mattias Samuelsson were on the ice for three goals against at five-on-five in this game.