3 major takeaways from the Buffalo Sabres big win on Saturday vs. Isles
The Buffalo Sabres broke through offensively and defensively, dominating the New York Islanders through three solid periods of hockey.
The Buffalo Sabres scored a huge victory last night against a tough New York Islanders team, winning the game 3-1 and showing the hockey world that they can win gritty hockey games. Sure, wearing the Goatheads may have helped, as the Sabres have improved to 11-1-1 while donning their iconic black sweaters, but it’s more likely that the win came because the Black and Red fine-tuned their game.
They played with an edge for all 60 minutes, and they also made things happen without the puck, something that plagued them last season and into the early stages of 2023-24. Excellent goaltending also fueled Buffalo, and it came because Eric Comrie isn’t feeling the same pressure that he felt last season now that he’s the clear-cut backup.
Takeaways from Buffalo Sabres big win over Islanders
1 – Fearless play
While the Sabres played their best game of the year, the early part of the first period saw them repeating the same mistakes they made offensively in their first four contests. There was way too much passing and way too little creating, but that alleviated as the game progressed.
Buffalo stepped it up in all three zones, and managed to shut down the Islanders while they created more opportunities for themselves. Then came Alex Tuch’s memorable fight against Adam Pelech, and from that point onward, the Sabres turned it up a notch, scoring at the 16:37 mark of the second thanks to Casey Mittelstadt finding Jeff Skinner.
Not even three minutes later, the Sabres scored again, this time with Jeff Skinner finding Mittelstadt, who somehow held onto the puck as he looked like he was about to faceplant to the ice, only to find Mattias Samuelsson, who did the rest. The Sabres played with such an edge during the second half of the middle frame that they eventually got under the Isles skin, but at that point, they were controlling the contest.
2 – Sabres stars made plays without the puck
While the Buffalo Sabres were busy shutting down the Islanders in the second period outshooting them 10-1 across the first half of the frame, Rasmus Dahlin was having the game of his life – without the puck. How good was Dahlin when the puck wasn’t in his possession? Check out what Lance Lysowski of Buffalo News wrote:
“The Sabres outscored the Islanders 2-0 and controlled 70.59 percent of the 5-on-5 shot attempts when Dahlin was on the ice. His five assists through five games are tied for second among all NHL defensemen and he had a team-high 23:02 of ice time Saturday.”
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If the Black and Red keep following Dahlin’s lead (and plenty of them made plays without the puck last night), then they will be the team we thought they would be all along. Their quality of play without the puck is what haunted the team last season, and it carried over into 2023-24 over the first four outings, but last night was a different story.
Now, the Sabres must show us they can be consistent and do the same thing for this week’s upcoming slate of games. It’s one thing to show flashes in one contest, but we can’t say they’re consistent without the puck just yet.
3 – Comrie is back in his element
Last season, Eric Comrie was supposed to be the 1A and hold the position down until at least Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen was ready to make the jump. But pedestrian play in the net showed us all that Comrie’s ceiling was that of an NHL backup who was best suited to start every few games.
This year, he sat out the first four games of the year while rookie Devon Levi got the nod, and it serves as no surprise that he looked like the Eric Comrie of 2021-22 during his time with the Winnipeg Jets. Having stopped 24 of 25 shots on goal with a 0.960 save percentage, it’s safe to say that Comrie only needs to play every third of fourth game, and he will be fine.
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If the Buffalo Sabres were to start Devon Levi from here on out in every other game, Comrie in roughly every three games, and Luukkonen in roughly every three for the duration that the latter is in the City of Good Neighbors, then they have good balance. If the Sabres revert back to two goaltenders, rolling with Levi every two to three games and Comrie sprinkling in will also work.
(Statistics provided by Hockey-Reference)