Buffalo, N.Y. (WGR Sports Radio 550) - After Friday's morning skate in Buffalo, Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff didn’t have good updates on goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen and defenseman Michael Kesselring. Neither player is going to be ready for opening night on Thursday, Oct. 9 against the New York Rangers.
"'Uppie' has a different injury than he’d been dealing with, and it’s going to be more than day-to-day. I don’t really have a time frame on it, but more than day-to-day. The same with Kesselring, it won’t be day-to-day," said Ruff following the morning skate.
This leaves the door wide-open for Alex Lyon in goal, as well as Ryan Johnson on defense.
Radim Mrtka was supposed to play against the Pittsburgh Penguins in the preseason finale on Friday, but Ruff says he’s sick and won't play. That means Zach Metsa has been recalled from the Rochester Americans.
Rasmus Dahlin played 27 minutes on Wednesday, and Ruff wants him to get the night off.
At times on Wednesday, the Sabres looked to me, like they were just trying to get the preseason over with. Usually this final road game is filled with Amerks players in the lineup, but Ruff didn’t want his regulars to end on that note.
"There was parts of the game you like, but there were parts of the game that were really sloppy that I didn’t like," he said.
"I didn’t like our special teams. I thought we broke the puck out pretty well, and we need to pick the pace up offensively and better on special teams."
With Zach Benson still out of the lineup, it’s giving Ruff a chance to see different looks on the top line. Peyton Krebs got the first opportunity with Josh Norris and Tage Thomspon, and on Friday. it’ll be Jack Quinn.
"We shook up every line just to take a look at different things," Ruff said. "It’s one last opportunity to see if you need to move pieces around inside of a game, what would it look like?"
Here's a look at Friday's lines:
Forwards:
Quinn - Norris - Thompson
Krebs - Kulich - Tuch
Zucker - McLeod - Doan
Malenstyn - Kozak - Danforth
Defense:
Byram - Komarov
Bryson - Metsa
Johnson - Timmins
Goalies:
Lyon
Georgiev
Tune in to "Schopp and the Bulldog" at 6 p.m. for pregame coverage on WGR when you’ll hear from Ruff, Owen Power and Jiri Kulich.
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