The Buffalo Sabres will arrive to training camp in September with a wide range of questions to answer after a highly disappointing 2024-25 season, and a quiet summer has once again left fans frustrated with the overall direction of the struggling franchise.
Buffalo has a solid foundation, headlined by dynamic forward Tage Thompson and do-it-all defenseman Rasmus Dahlin, but the roster as a whole isn't on the same level as the NHL's elite. In turn, the team typically needs a lot of things to go right just to enter playoff contention.
That's still the case heading into the 2025-26 campaign, which gets underway Oct. 9 against the New York Rangers, so let's examine a few factors that absolutely must go in the Sabres' favor if they're finally going to climb the Eastern Conference standings.
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen must regain 2023-24 form
UPL was awful last season, there's really no way around that. He posted a 3.20 goals against average and a .887 save percentage across 55 appearances. His negative-19.9 goals saved above average ranked 102nd out of 103 NHL goalies, according to Hockey Reference.
Yes, the Sabres' error-riddled play in their defensive zone did their starting goalie no favors, but he also struggled to come up with even routine saves at times. It's no mistake the team's best stretch of play came when head coach Lindy Ruff started giving backup James Reimer more consistent starts.
"Of course, there's more than the numbers show," UPL told Bill Hoppe of the Times Herald in March. "But in the end, you can always kind of say what you want, like kind of say something about how we played as a team in some of those games. But in the end, I got to be better, too. I feel like that's kind of the thing with our whole team. Everybody has to be better, everybody has to figure out their own game and what to do better, and kind of build it from there."
The good news for Buffalo and Luukkonen is that he's only one year removed from the best season of his young career. He compiled a 2.57 GAA and .910 SV% in 2023-24, which led general manager Kevyn Adams to give him a five-year, $23.75 million contract extension.
If he can get back to that level this season, the Sabres' playoff chances will increase exponentially. Sure, he'll have more help in the form of a defensive depth chart that's been rebuild over the past 18 months, but it ultimately comes down to him simply playing better.
Should UPL struggle again, however, it's far from a guarantee that either Alex Lyon or Devon Levi will be able to step up to fill the void, which will in turn put Buffalo's season in major jeopardy.
Jack Quinn is facing a make-or-break season
Quinn burst on to the scene with a 37-point rookie season in 2022-23. Perhaps the most promising aspect of the campaign was the fact 13 of his 14 goals came at even strength. It gave him the look of a future 30-goal scorer.
Unfortunately, the 2020 first-round pick suffered a ruptured Achilles during a 2023 offseason workout, which caused him to miss the start of the next season. While he's played 101 games across two years since the injury, he's never looked like the same player.
Quinn has looked a stride or two slow as of late. That's negatively impacted his ability to get into prime scoring areas in the offensive zone, and he's never been a player who does a ton of dirty work around the crease. His main trait is his lethal shot and he hasn't been able to get into position to use it.
Now, just three years removed from that promising rookie run, he's likely staring down his final opportunity to prove himself as a full-time NHL player.
His 44.9% 5-on-5 expected goals for percentage (xGF%) last season ranked 15th among 17 qualified Sabres forwards, per Natural Stat Trick. His inability to create dangerous chances consistently combined with lackluster defensive play is a worrisome combination.
The Sabres will hope a fully healthy offseason will put him on a path toward redemption. A lack of production this season could bring an end to his time in Buffalo, though.
Power play can't be totally useless again
Although Buffalo's limited number of offseason moves wasn't a major surprise based on the front office's recent track record, the one semi-shocking element of the summer is that the team decided not to make any changes to the coaching staff.
Ruff's history as a team legend was always going to get him at least one more season behind the bench despite last year's underwhelming results. But a change to his assistants was expected, particularly because the power play has been awful two campaigns in a row.
The Sabres' PP finished 24th in 2024-25 (18.8%) and 28th in 2023-24 (16.6%), and somehow it's felt even worse. The number of opportunities with the man advantage where Buffalo doesn't even get into its set alignment is borderline mind-boggling. The unit's entries are atrocious at times.
Yet, Adams decided to run it back with the same group of assistant coaches — Seth Appert, Mike Bales, Matt Ellis and Marty Wilford — and it's a choice that could come back to haunt the team if the power play is once again a key reason it falls short.
The pieces are there, too. Thompson is one of the league's best weapons in man-up situations and the roster features two legit power-play quarterbacks in Rasmus Dahlin and Owen Power (maybe even three if you count Bowen Byram). It's not a talent issue.
Success hasn't followed because the system is disjointed with no proven approach. If nothing changes, it's a singular problem that could keep Buffalo out of the playoffs.