Tampa, Fla. (WGR 550) – I thought that was one gutty effort the Buffalo Sabres put forth Saturday night in Tampa Bay against the Lightning.
Before the game, the Sabres found out they would be without their best defenseman in Rasmus Dahlin, who's dealing with an upper-body injury. He's still considered as day-to-day.
That was in addition to Mattias Samuelsson and Henri Jokiharju already being out.
With all that, they walked into a very intimidating, sold out atmosphere and played the Lightning almost even.
They needed Eric Comrie’s best game in net and they got it, as Comrie made numerous Grade-A saves on Tampa Bay’s stars.
The game-winning goal came from the slot when Lightning defenseman Nick Perbix jumped in and scored his first NHL goal. Comrie was extremely upset with himself that he let in that goal, and said after the game a save needs to be made, because his team should’ve won that game.
The worst thing about that goal is right before, Jeff Skinner had walked in alone on a breakaway that would’ve given Buffalo the 4-3 lead.
I understand where Comrie’s coming from, but that, by far, was his best game with the Sabres. He said no way, because they didn’t win when they should have.
The Sabres had plenty of zone time in this game and plenty of chances. The reason I would say Tampa Bay had the better of the play was because they had the edge in quality chances.
The team was happy with the effort, but disappointed that Skinner gave them a 3-2 lead at the 4:25 mark of the third period and they couldn’t get any points out of the game.
Casey Mittelstadt had tied the game at 2-2 on the power play when he tipped in Owen Power’s shot midway through the second period. Buffalo’s power play has really been clicking for a while, scoring in six-straight games and nine out of 10.
Power was the workhorse in Dahlin’s absence, and the 19-year-old did very well. Power played 28:14, while Jacob Bryson played 26:15. I thought Kale Clague had his best game since being called up from Rochester, as his minutes got up to 21:14 as a result.
Ilya Lyubushkin returned with very little practice time. He had missed four games with a foot injury. He had to play over 22 minutes of ice time.
The Sabres were, again, very stingy with Casey Fitzgerald and Lawrence Pilut’s minutes. Despite this being a back-to-back situation, Fitzgerald only saw 6:09 of playing time, while Pilut was on the ice for 10:04.
For the second-straight game, the star on the other team killed the Sabres.
Nikita Kucherov had a goal and three assists for four points. Had it not been for Comrie, he could’ve had quite a bit more.
The man the Sabres refused to sign after drafting him, Brandon Hagel, had three points, while Brayden Point had a goal and an assist.
The Sabres lost both games on the road trip to very good teams, but it just goes to show them that as much improvement as they’ve shown, there’s still work to be done.
It would be great to see how they could match up with the Hurricanes and the Lightning if they were healthy on defense. However, they have to play with the hand that they’re dealt.
Buffalo has Sunday off and will host the Arizona Coyotes on Tuesday.
