The Buffalo Sabres are off to a surprising 6-3-0 start for the 2022-23 season and are slated for a showdown to kick off November.
The Buffalo Sabres are shocking the league, thanks to their hot, 6-3-0 start. Now, the bad news is, they have enjoyed success in October in the past, finishing 9-2-2 in 2019-20 and 5-2-1 last season. The Sabres also delivered us some fools gold in 2018-19 when they sat at 17-7-3 at the end of November.
But since March 2022, this team is currently 22-12-3 (47 points). Not bad after the previous three months. And even more impressive, the Sabres are showing they can indeed sustain their success, even with the league’s youngest team. So will they be able to add to that total in November 2022? Here are three bold predictions.
1 – Buffalo Sabres WILL sustain success
The Sabres don’t have an easy slate of games coming up, starting with a showdown against the Pittsburgh Penguins. And while the Pens have seen their struggles, let’s not get brash: This hockey team is more than capable of digging themselves out of holes.
But this Sabres team, like the Sabres of the past, have also experienced adversity, given injuries to half their defensive rotation early. It has tested them, and while they haven’t always delivered promising performances, they have translated their play into wins. And it’s why they will continue, even with a tough schedule, to sustain that success throughout November.
2 – Sabres upset Eichel, Matthews
The Sabres won Round 1 of the Jack Eichel Trade in just about every facet. Now that we are approaching the one-year mark of the trade, we are also approaching another showdown with the ex-Sabre.
An ex-Sabre who, yes, is leading one of the NHL’s best teams at the moment. But the Sabres won’t just stop Eichel’s Vegas Golden Knights on November 10th; they will also march into, or skate into, Toronto, and knock off Auston Matthews and the Toronto Maple Leafs. The combined score? I’m saying 11-5 with some healthy defensemen back in action.
The Sabres saw themselves finish 4-0 against these two teams back in March and April, so predicting a win in both outings is a bold, but realistic proposition.
3 – Dahlin, Thompson, combine for 14 goals
Sounds bold, but this duo combined for 12 in half a month. Thompson appears to be approaching midseason form after his dominant performance against the Detroit Red Wings last night, and as we know, Dahlin set an NHL record for a defenseman in scoring one goal over the season’s first five games.
Overall, the Sabres are turning into a rough, tough all-out offensive team with the capability of going on a scoring frenzy night after night. Their 37 goals scored (4.1 goals per game) ranked third in the NHL in October, so to project remarkable output from Dahlin, Tage, and others is very realistic.
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