After a tough start to the season in the loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets, the Buffalo Sabres bounced back with two straight wins before a poor effort in a shutout loss to the Dallas Stars. With the team in danger of reeling after a 2-2 start, head coach Lindy Ruff decided to make two of his young players, Konsta Helenius and Jiri Kulich, the scapegoats, scratching them for the next game with the Utah Mammoth.
Sam Carrick and Justin Danforth were inserted into the lineup for that game, and it didn't go as the coach planned, with both players looking invisible in the 4-1 loss. In one move, Ruff risked losing the confidence of two of his brightest young players, all for another blowout loss where they wouldn't have done any worse than the two veterans he inserted into the lineup.
It is the risk the Sabres take by employing an old-school coach in Ruff. The league is quickly shifting more towards a player-first mentality, and some coaches who believe in scratching young players for little reason are starting to fall by the wayside.
There are reasons why coaches like John Tortorella and Craig Berube aren't getting as many opportunities, while new-school coaches like Ryan Craig and Manny Malholtra are getting jobs, and soon-to-be head coaches like Denver University's David Carle are getting interviews.
Old-school guys like Mike Babcock are still getting opportunities as well, but even he is coaching with a bit of a refined approach through the early portion of the season. Ruff is still the man for the job and had great success last season, but he might need to take a page out of Babcock's book there and continue to adapt to the changing landscape.
Konsta Helenius' chance to have a break out for the Sabres
The old-school approach is to watch a young player sometimes shy away from the battle and immediately stick him in the press box. However, as the game moves away from the rough-and-tumble style, there are other factors that coaches need to consider.
Take Helenius, who has just one goal this season but is dominating the game analytically and is primed for a breakout. His 62.3 xGF% (expected goals for percentage) is one of the top marks on the team, and while some coaches may not buy into the advanced analytics as much as others, it'd be hard for those expected numbers to pay off from the press box.
Helenius didn't have his best game against the Stars, both with the eye test and analytically, but the team wasn't any better with him out of the lineup, either. He still didn't contribute on the score sheet when he returned Monday afternoon against the Florida Panthers, but he was still on the cusp with a 62.35 xGF%.
If the Sabres are going to lean into their youth, they may as well continue to roll them out and wait for their good play to pay off. If Helenius continues to dominate the analytics, it is almost guaranteed that he will go through a stretch where the offense comes in bunches, which will make the team look silly for ever putting him in the press box for a 4-1 loss against the Mammoth.
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