Sabres news: Sabres are set on goalies for this season
The Buffalo Sabres will have a totally different goalie room going into this season than they did on opening night last year, but we already knew that. The Sabres lost Linus Ullmark to the Bruins and Carter Hutton to the Coyotes. In response to this, Buffalo signed Aaron Dell and veteran goalie Craig Anderson. It looks like there will be four goalies battling for the roster spots going into the season.
Anderson and Dell will join Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen and Dustin Tokarski as the goalies most likely fighting for a roster spot in camp and preseason. Anderson and Dell only combined for 11 appearances last season. Luukkonen and Tokarski did not play much more in Buffalo. UPL played in four games last season, and Tokarski played the most of the four with 13 games played last year.
Kevyn Adams seems content with rolling with these four goalies going into this season. Ultimately the plan is that UPL eventually takes over as the everyday starter in Buffalo. So the more playing time he gets now, the more beneficial that will be to future Sabres teams.
And Buffalo is nowhere near a spot to be a contender, so there is no reason to not give a young player like UPL more playing time in the NHL, especially given the other goalies competing for a roster spot.
Next. Is holding onto Eichel hurting his trade value?. dark
It may have been a bit of a surprise that the Sabres choice to go this route with their goalie situation. They are placing a lot of faith in goalies that are either unproven, past their prime, or just not starting-caliber goaltenders in the NHL. But like I stated before, the Sabres are not a contender at the moment, so if they were to have a goalie room like they do, now is the best time to have it.