One burning question for the Sabres after the first 15 games of the season
After 15 games this season, the Sabres are clinging to relevance with a 7-7-1 record, good for 15 points in what has become a so-so division.
If the Buffalo Sabres snap their NHL-record playoff drought this season, it might come thanks in part to the Atlantic Division being so bad. Buffalo earned its 15th point today in a win over the Calgary Flames, putting them in a three-way tie for third place as Saturday night’s evening slate of games got underway.
When the 2024-25 season began, however, we were supposed to see a new-look Sabres team take the ice, even if we’ve seen more of a stagnant bunch out there lately. And it’s something we saw once again in the Blue and Gold’s Saturday matinee win.
One of the key traits was supposed to be more physical play, something we’ve only seen flashes of this year. Counting Saturday’s win, the Sabres now have 338 hits, good for 22.5 per game. And while this is technically the most physical we’ve seen the team in a while, that number is a modest increase over the 21.8 per contest they achieved last season. Yeah, not much of a difference.
When will we finally see a more physical Sabres team take the ice?
We saw this team just dominate when they decided to land more than a few body checks in their win earlier this week over the Ottawa Senators. But that physicality wasn’t quite on display following their upset victory over the New York Rangers when they checked the Blueshirts just 17 times.
What’s sad is that general manager Kevyn Adams did go out and get big hitters in the offseason, but the physical play has, for the most part, been inconsistent at best. Beck Malenstyn has been as advertised, and I’ll give Nicolas Aube-Kubel a free pass since he missed time with an injury.
But Sam Lafferty has been a disappointment and ditto for Rasmus Dahlin, who I thought would land body check after body check while maintaining his offensive prowess under Ruff. Dahlin has been doing the latter at an elite level, so that’s the good news, but Ruff’s system should have unleashed what had been very aggressive play during the last two seasons of the Don Granato era.
Jason Zucker has been a big hitter in the past. And while he’s impressed me in points production, Zucker was also supposed to come in and forge some of this culture change and it hasn’t happened.
So, when is consistent physical play coming? Can anyone answer that? It’s great to see the Sabres back at 0.500, but this remains far from a complete team if they want to become a surefire playoff contender.
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