Buffalo, NY (WGR 550) - The Buffalo Sabres got goalied on Thursday by a goalie that had some of the worst stats in the National Hockey League. Joel Hofer came into Buffalo with a 5.02 goals against and .859 save percentage. It didn’t take him long to start frustrating the Sabres.
Rasmus Dahlin who hit two posts on the evening came down the slot, made a nifty move and Hofer stopped him cold, then on the power play Josh Doan was alone in front and Jack Quinn made a REALLY nifty move to set up Doan and Hofer got the glove up to absolutely rob him. Both coaches felt that save is what sent the Blues on their way. Right after that save, Quinn turns the puck over to Mathieu Joseph, the Sabres don’t get a big save from Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen and it’s 1-0.
Later, Luukkonen lets in an unscreened shot from Nick Bjugstad that he’d want back and that ended the scoring until the worst team I’ve ever seen at 6-on-5 let in the empty net goal.
Buffalo had no chance to come back as they got a penalty in the third period with 3:17 left. This is something Ruff has been harping on and it happens on a regular basis.
The part of the game Ruff didn’t like is despite Hofer making 28 saves, he thought they passed up too many shots. The one that sticks in my mind is on the late penalty kill Alex Tuch led a 2-on-1. Veteran defenseman Justin Faulk played it perfectly and took the pass away, yet Tuch tried to force the puck through to Mattias Samuelsson and there was no chance. I will ask you, who would you rather have shooting on a 2-on-1? Tuch who was a 36-goal scorer last season or Samuelsson who has nine career goals in over 200 NHL games?
The Blues were as bad as they could possibly be in Washington on Wednesday losing to the Caps 6-1. Coach Jim Montgomery laid into them about giving little to no effort and it put a goal scorer like Jordan Kyrou in the press box.
St. Louis did play desperate, blocking 19 shots in the game as the Sabres had 60 shot attempts to the Blues 38.
I realize the Sabres have scored one goal in their last two at home, but I’m not really worried about a team that is 5-1-2 in their last eight home games and has two regulation losses in their last 11 overall.
Where this could get very bad is what’s ahead. Buffalo is 0-2-2 on the road and has a four-game road trip in Carolina, Utah, Colorado and Detroit. That could turn into a disaster very quickly. By going 5-1-4 all they did is keep up in the Eastern Conference. Coming home 0-4 or 1-3 on the road trip and could put them at the bottom of the Eastern Conference.
What would really help is getting Jason Zucker and Jiri Kulich back which is possible. It doesn’t sound like they’ll get Zach Benson back in time.