If I’ve sounded like a perma-bear lately, or in more layman’s terms, a pessimist, know that the Sabres didn’t need to make it this way. But when you score three goals in three games, and you got the defending Stanley Cup Champions raring to go, there’s no way one can even be remotely optimistic here.
While we can’t control how the players perform on the ice, I still blame Kevyn Adams because he had quite a long window to fix this madness by upgrading one portion of the team. He didn’t, so the results of neglecting it are showing.
So, if you ask me what I think will happen to the Sabres tonight, I’ll say that, in a best-case scenario, their goaltending will keep this game from getting completely out of hand. At this point, the Sabres will have Devon Levi in the net, and he was about the only good thing that happened to this team during its ill-fated two-game stretch in Prague, apart from Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen’s performance in Game 1.
The Sabres haven’t won all year, and they won’t win tonight vs. Florida
Okay, maybe that’s a little too rash of a prediction, because in an 82-game season, there isn’t a single team in hockey that won’t struggle through an off-night. But the odds of it happening to the Panthers are so slim that I think he just left the City of Good Neighbors. That said, unless some miracle occurs, this one’s going to the defending champions.
Now that we’ve established that the Sabres are in a bad situation tonight let’s also point out, again, just how unwinnable October 2024 now looks. They have a favorable road trip coming up against the Pittsburgh Penguins, Columbus Blue Jackets, and Chicago Blackhawks, but the former just dropped six goals on the Detroit Red Wings, so they’re not as bad as they initially looked this season.
Columbus just lost Boone Jenner, and this young team is in the middle of another rebuilding year, so if there’s a place where the Sabres can steal a win, it’s in Columbus. As for Chicago, they’ve struggled. But it’s also a new-look team that will enjoy its good nights, and recent history has shown us many of those good games against teams in a similar position as the Blackhawks like to put forth their best efforts vs. the Blue and Gold.
The end of the month also looks unwinnable
Once again, they’ll have a homestand to end the month, but one of those games will also come vs. Florida, after they play the Dallas Stars and Detroit Red Wings. I don’t know; maybe the Wings will struggle through another bad defensive outing, and the Blue and Gold will steal one?
Anyway, if I were to give you an honest prediction of how many games the Sabres will win come the first of November, it’s two, and that’s pushing it. This means they’ll be roughly 2-8-0 to end October unless they can pick up a loser point or two, but right now, I don’t like their chances.