The Buffalo Sabres own the longest playoff drought in NHL history at 14 years. A lot of front-office mismanagement and on-ice mistakes transformed a formidable franchise into a yearly also-ran, which has worn down perhaps the best hockey market in the United States.
Yet, Sabres fans still care. Many of them remember the Party in the Plaza celebrations that watched as the high-flying teams led by Chris Drury and Daniel Briere made deep postseason runs. Others yearn for defensively strong squads like the late-1990s ones led by Dominik Hasek.
One thing's for certain: If the Sabres show legitimate progress in 2025-26, Buffalonians will return to the KeyBank Center in droves. Their fandom isn't dead, it's merely dormant. They're waiting for a group that shows it deserves their support.
Below you'll find a list of topics, which will be updated throughout the season, where Sabre Noise writers will debate the most pressing issues facing Buffalo's hockey team as the organization attempts to make Western New York feel Cup crazy again.
Buffalo Sabres debates: Full list of 2025-26 discussions
Oct. 1, 2025
Kevyn Adams or Lindy Ruff, who's under more pressure for the Buffalo Sabres?
Key topics that will determine the Sabres' fate
Goaltending
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen is coming off a pair of polar opposite seasons. He posted 2.57 goals against average and .910 save percentage in 2023-24 before signing a five-year, $23.75 million contract extension. He followed that up with a lackluster 3.20 GAA and .887 SV% last season.
Whether UPL can bounce back in a significant way is the single biggest factor in the Sabres' campaign, slightly ahead of whether Josh Norris can stay healthy to help lead the team's top line.
Buffalo does have a trio of other options in net — Alex Lyon, Alexandar Georgiev and prospect Devon Levi — but none of them can be confidently counted on to carry a full starter's workload if UPL falters. It would be a rotation with head coach Lindy Ruff hoping to catch lightning in a bottle.
Unfortunately for the Sabres, if the goalie struggles continue in 2025-26, it may not matter how much progress they make in other areas. Poor play between the pipes can sink an entire team.
Special teams
Buffalo's performance on the power play and the penalty kill is a cornerstone reason it finished 12 points out of the playoffs last season.
The Sabres ranked 24th with the man advantage (18.8%) and 23rd when playing a man (or two) down (76.3%). Those struggles made it quite surprising the organization opted not to make any changes to the coaching staff, particularly the group of assistant coaches, in the offseason.
Their power-play failures were especially frustrating because the talent is there for the unit to find high-end success. The Blue and Gold feature one of the NHL's best PP weapons in Tage Thompson and one of its most effective PP quarterbacks in Rasmus Dahlin.
What's been missing is a hardworking net-front presence, a role new acquisition Josh Doan is working to show he's capable of filling as part of an impressive preseason. Players like Doan and Zach Benson could help the power play turn things around this season.
Growth of young players
Benson headlines a set of returning under-25 players the Sabres will be counting on to take a major step forward in 2025-26. It's a group that also includes Doan, Jiri Kulich, Jack Quinn, Peyton Krebs and Bowen Byram. All of them have the ability to take their game to another level.
If there's one thing multiple Buffalo front offices have been too bullish on over the past 14 years, however, it's year-to-year internal improvement. Every summer the general manager, which at the current moment is Kevyn Adams, has preached the growth of young players. It's rarely materialized.
In turn, Adams must be more aggressive in his efforts to upgrade the roster this season if the Sabres aren't seeing that improvement early. Last year, he sat around far too long without making a move, which led to a 13-game losing streak that destroyed the campaign.
All told, it's possible everything falls perfectly into place and Buffalo makes a serious surge up the Eastern Conference standings. Things rarely going exactly according to plan, though. A midseason addition or two will likely be needed to get the Sabres over the hump.