Thank You, Sabres, for looking like a real hockey team

The roster isn’t talented enough. The Jack Eichel drama will be a huge distraction. The Buffalo Sabres are starting from scratch after trading Reinhart and Ristolainen. The team doesn’t even have a captain and is likely to finish dead last in the whole league.

HA!

These were just some of the things we heard in the lead-up to the 2021-2022 season as every expert in the league predicted another embarrassing failure in Buffalo. It appears the players heard these things, too because they are playing as though they are taking it personally.

Six games into a season that everyone said was lost before it even began, the Buffalo Sabres have collected nine out of a possible 12 points. They have defeated both of last season’s Stanley Cup Finals participants and they have positioned themselves in second place in the Northeast Division behind Sam Reinhart and the unbeaten Florida Panthers.

Kyle Okposo promised in a letter to the fans after the first game that the team would be exciting, and that the guys would give maximum effort. And that is exactly what they have done so far.

The fans came to their feet as the last 30 seconds ticked away on a 5-2 win over Vancouver last week and then again, a few games later at the end of a 5-1 win over the defending Stanley Cup Champion Tampa Bay Lightning. The fans were small in number but big in volume as they showed their appreciation for the effort. I could feel the energy coming right into my living room. It has been the most I have enjoyed watching the Sabres in a long time and I just wanted to say “Thank You.”

Forwards: thank you for winning puck battles, keeping shifts alive in the offensive zone and generating lots of scoring chances. Thank you for shooting the puck on net and working hard to get rebounds. Thank you for being defensively responsible and helping to prevent easy goals against. And thank you for hustling to get to loose pucks and concentrating enough to collect passes cleanly.

Defensemen: Thank you for knowing where you are supposed to be in your own zone. Thank you for being aware enough to find the puck after your goalie makes a save. And thank you for moving the puck effectively with passes that aren’t always in the skates of your teammates.

Thank you, Craig Anderson and Dustin Tokarski for making timely saves and helping weather the occasional storm in the defensive zone.

Thank you, Don Granato and the rest of the staff for making these guys believe in themselves and demanding that they accept nothing less than maximum effort.

Thank you Kevyn Adams for filling the roster with guys that WANT to be a member of the Buffalo Sabres. It is clear that they are taking pride in the uniform.

I just spent the last year and a half writing a book about 10 seasons of failure. It is called “Group Therapy for Sabres Fans” and it is available now in e-book form online. It is with great joy that I get to shift gears and write about the team’s early success.

The Sabres have a long way to go before anyone outside the team’s dressing room will believe they are for real. But for now, after an offseason that featured a mass exodus and an untenable impasse with the team’s biggest star, it is certainly is nice to have a little bit of time to bask in the glow of success.

Thanks, guys.