Coming out of a two-week break due to COVID-19, the Buffalo Sabres got off to a slow start, but have progressively gotten back to form with wins in two of their last three games.
The Sabres are coming off a four-game road trip that saw the team going 2-2-0, but the team seemed to play much better as the games went along. After a loss to the Washington Capitals in Game 1 of the trip, Buffalo then collected a win over the New Jersey Devils, followed by a loss to the New York Islanders, and then another win over the Devils on Tuesday night in Newark.
With the team currently sitting at 6-8-2 in the standings and coming up on a massive stretch of games in a small time frame, Buffalo is gearing up for a nice three-game home stretch, starting Thursday night against the Devils at KeyBank Center. The Sabres will then host a two-game weekend series with the Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday and Sunday, before heading out on the road again for a five-game trip away from Buffalo.
The Sabres have played relatively well over the past few games in their matchups with the Devils and Islanders, generating more quality offensive scoring chances at even strength, while capitalizing when up a man on the power play. Meanwhile, the defense has played relatively well, while the goaltending from Linus Ullmark has been enough to keep Buffalo competitively in games.
This positive production has come without some of their top players producing goals, as usually expected. It has also come without a couple of their top players in the lineup, whether due to injury, COVID-19, or being a healthy scratch.
The most talked about player, due to his absence from the lineup, has been forward Jeff Skinner. The 28-year-old has been a healthy scratch from the lineup in the past two games, and is expected to be a healthy scratch again on Thursday night against the Devils.
Head coach Ralph Krueger joined Howard Simon and Jeremy White on Thursday as part of his weekly appearances on WGR. When asked about the reasoning behind making Skinner a healthy scratch, Krueger explained he's trying to get his scoring winger to reach the best level of play that he possibly can going forward.
"The responsibility to get the maximum out of a player lies on two fronts: The coaching front and on the player. There's a combination of getting players to their potential, which is what we're all about here," he said. "It's why we get up in the morning as coaches, and the players, we're assuming at the National Hockey League level, are doing the same. There's different ways to get people to their potential. There's also many different factors that come into play before we put our final roster together. It's a very complex process we go through.
"The goal is that Jeff gets to his 'A-game', that he's the best possible player for the Buffalo Sabres. As a leader and a coach, I can't reveal all the different pathways we have to get players there. Sometimes that path may be a little rough and rugged. At the end of the day, you're hoping the decisions we make give us the best chance to win on a day, but also help each and every player get to where we expect them to be."
While Skinner has been producing with scoring chances and shots on goal, he has yet to score a goal this season in 14 games. His struggles have carried over from last year, where he netted just 14 goals in 59 games before the season was shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In Skinner's first season with the Sabres after being acquired from the Carolina Hurricanes, he managed to score 40 goals and produce 63 points in 82 games played, which earned him an eight-year contract extension worth an average annual value of $9 million.
Despite the struggles and the lack of goals being scored, Krueger and the Sabres clearly know that Skinner's role with the Sabres now and going forward is to be a goal scorer.
"All of our players need to participate in the complete game and the whole game," Krueger said on WGR. "You all know how much we care for the game without the puck to give us a chance as quick as possible to be with the puck again. It's clear for everybody that he is a 5-on-5 goal scorer. At the moment, the way the roster fell together, [it freed] him up in that 5-on-5 area to be a depth goal scorer for us, at the moment."
Krueger was also asked about his team's play since the return from the COVID-19 break, as well as the conditions of players like Rasmus Ristolainen, Tobias Rieder and Jack Eichel heading into the games ahead.
Here is some of what he had to say:
Krueger on how the team has been handling the hectic schedule of the 2020-21 season:
"Everybody's dealing with this unique season in the best possible way. We came out of the COVID [break] with our energy a little bit down, and we were behind the eight ball slightly on our conditioning because of the break we were forced to take. But I feel we're in a really in a good place now. Other than the injuries we picked up, which were disappointing, the group that is healthy... we're as good as we can be, under the circumstances."
Krueger on Ristolainen's status coming back from his bout with COVID-19:
"Coming off of this COVID, which I have experienced personally myself and can speak first-hand about it, it sneaks up on you still here and there. It doesn't just go away overnight, you don't flick a switch and it's gone. With 'Risto', there's no timeline. It's one day at a time. His health and well-being remain No. 1, and until we're 100% on that, he won't be playing."
Krueger on Tobias Rieder's upper-body injury:
"He remains day-to-day. ... It's certainly not a long-term injury. We're just managing that, because of the combination of him coming off COVID, having had symptoms and now this upper-body injury. We're just being a little more cautious on the re-entry with him."
Krueger on the impact of Jake McCabe's absence in the lineup:
"His blood is blue and gold, and every move he makes is for the team. That is then carried on the ice, where he is our leader in a defensive capacity, but also his game this year was the best hockey I've seen Jake play. He took a step this year that was so exciting. He added some very, very important dynamics to our offense. ... It's a huge loss, but we are working hard with him to get him back in time for training camp next season."
Krueger on Jack Eichel's getting back to his game through the 2020-21 season:
"Everybody has to realize that he had an injury pre-training camp that pretty well parked him from doing a lot of physical activity for multiple weeks. He started training camp a week delayed. With the game pace that we've had and then the almost eight-day break that everybody had just a few weeks ago, he has worked as hard as anybody else to get himself up to speed, but all the circumstances are preventing him from being at 100% physical conditioning and shape because we have no practices, no training times in-between the games. We're trying to do it at the same time.
"Jack took a good step last game, and we expect him to continue. We have him on a trajectory where we did not expect him to be caught up with every body else physically until around this time, so I'm not surprised by it with the COVID break we had. Again, we liked what happened in the last few days and how he's feeling. I'm sure the whole team and Jack have now put COVID behind them, the whole break behind them and we're going to go to another level here in the next few games."
Krueger on his communication with general manager Kevyn Adams:
"Kevyn and I are permanently in discussions, and he is doing an outstanding job of keeping everything up on the table in all areas and aspects of the club right now. We are very aligned philosophically in what the future Buffalo Sabres product needs to look like, and what the present Buffalo Sabres product needs to look like to be successful. There's no hold back in communication going on, and [it's been] very constructive. For him, it's most important for what is best for the team right now because of the way the season is coming at us and the pace of games coming at us. We always have to have conversations on the next step of the bigger picture."
You can listen to the entire interview below:
