Fort Lauderdale, Fla. (WGR Sports Radio 550) - The Buffalo Sabres played a "blah" game on Saturday, and it resulted in a 4-0 loss to the Florida Panthers.
Vitek Vanecek has made a career out of beating the Sabres, but this 21-save shutout likely was the easiest of his career.
In 14 career games against Buffalo, he has a record of 11-2-1. In the 13 games before this one, he had a 2.39 goals-against average and a .917 save percentage.
Trailing 3-0 in the third period, there was zero urgency from Buffalo. The Sabres got outshot, 12-3, and took nine minutes to get their first shot of the period.
I think the frustrating part for fans watching this would be almost every great opportunity Buffalo produced, Vanecek didn’t have to make a save. The only difficult save he had was when Peyton Krebs went in on a breakaway and he got his blocker on it.
Jack Quinn and a clear lane to the net and didn’t shoot, as he tried to pass to a covered guy. Quinn had another 2-on-1 in this game and did not take the shot.
Alex Tuch hit the post from the left circle early in the second period.
As Zach Benson came out of the penalty box in the third period, he had a breakaway and the puck rolled off his stick as he went to the backhand.
Vanecek did have a nice save from the slot on newcomer Josh Norris.
With Jason Zucker hurt and some type of illness going through this team, Jordan Greenway was out, and Quinn was weak and shouldn’t have played. That put Isak Rosen and Josh Dunne into the lineup from the Rochester Americans.
Newly acquired defenseman Jacob Bernard-Docker wasn’t available due to visa problems.
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen had another rough night in goal, as two shots by Nate Schmidt slid under him with players behind him to put the puck into a wide-open net. Luukkonen made 32 saves on 35 shots faced.
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After Saturday's game, Tuch was still pretty down on losing Dylan Cozens to the trade.
"Losing 'Cuzy' sucks. It really does," said Tuch. "He was a little brother to me. Plus Dennis Gilbert, I’ve known ‘Gibby’ since he was 6-years-old. The reason those guys are gone is because of the rest of us sitting in here. We weren’t good enough this year.
"I put a lot of pressure on myself, and I wasn’t good enough to help them stay and help them be successful."
Buffalo is now winless in six games, going 0-5-1. That goes with the 0-10-3 record they posted before Christmas that put them out of any hope for the playoffs.
This is a team that was challenged by their coach to go 3-1-1 in each of the final five-game segments of the season. They went 2-2-1 in the first five games, and 0-3-0 in the second so far.
This is a group that often doesn’t play with passion or intensity, and Saturday was just another example. That’s why Cozens, Gilbert and Henri Jokiharju are playing elsewhere.