Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen's injury and other takeaways from Sabres 5-3 loss to Penguins

The regular season is right around the corner for the Buffalo Sabres and the final home preseason game was on Wednesday night. However, the Sabres leave this game with more concerns and questions than confidence and answers.

It starts in the net as the Sabres were going to have Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen making his preseason debut. However, it was short-lived, and he left after the first period, having suffered another lower-body injury. They would have Alexandar Georgiev finish the final two periods but he struggled as he allowed three goals on 13 shots.

The Penguins led the whole way in this game but the Sabres would keep it close and cut it to a one-goal game on Rasmus Dahlin's power play goal in the third period. However, the Penguins would put it away with an empty net goal by Filip Hallander.

These are three of the takeaways from the game on Wednesday night.

Time for the Buffalo Sabres to panic about goalie

There is no question that goalie was a concern for the Buffalo Sabres, even with Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen returning for this game. He was going to be the starting goalie for this team but it remained to be seen if he was going to rebound from his performance last season.

However, Luukkonen was only able to play one period after he re-aggravated his lower-body injury. The Sabres seemed to be doing everything they could to make sure the injury was behind him and increase his workload slowly.

It remains to be seen how severe the injury is and how much of a setback he is dealing with. After the game, Lindy Ruff was not ready to discuss a contingency plan if Luukkonen is not ready for the regular season.

However, it has to be frustrating for Luukkonen that he was not able to play more than one period. If this injury does linger, this means it will either be Alex Lyon or Alexandar Georgiev in net, and this is not what the Sabres were hoping for entering the season.

Sabres struggle on special teams against the Penguins

The Buffalo Sabres did have one goal on the power play, which was an incredible individual effort by Rasmus Dahlin. But for most of the night, it was a sloppy performance from the team, whether it was on the power play or on the penalty kill.

The Sabres would allow five power play shots and one power play goal to the Penguins on three power chances.

It wasn't much better when they had the man advantage, as the Sabres only scored once on four power play chances and only were able to muster five power play shots. While they had moments, they also had a lot of missed opportunities with missed shots and just struggled to get set up.

On a night that the Sabres had their top power play unit, the expectations were higher, and they did not deliver.

Josh Norris showing what he can do for this team

One of the few bright spots from this game was the performance by Josh Norris, who had both of the Sabres' goals. The first goal was only a few seconds after the Penguins' power play goal in the first period, when he was able to skate through a trip, bounce back up to beat Arturs Silovs for the goal.

The second goal was set up beautifully by Tage Thompson who was able to pass the puck in front of the net to the waiting Norris who wasted no time getting it past Silovs.

In addition to the goal scoring, Norris made his presence known in the face-off circle as he won almost 65% of the face-offs.

The Buffalo Sabres will close out the preseason on Friday in Pittsburgh against the Penguins.