Buffalo, N.Y. (WGR Sports Radio 550) - Buffalo Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff described Thursday night's 5-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins quite well during his postgame comments.
"We picked the wrong time to pitch a dud," he said.
The Penguins are now 16-4-3 in their last 23 games in Buffalo after pasting the Sabres right before the Olympic break.
If I would’ve told you that Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin were only going to have one assist between them, you would’ve thought the Sabres were going to win. Well, it wasn’t them that won the game.
It was Buffalo feeding the Pittsburgh offense with bad passes and multiple turnovers, and the Penguins' youngsters took advantage. It’s hard to win games when the Sabres passed the puck as poorly as they did on Thursday.
In his first NHL game, Avery Hayes scored two goals by 18:47 of the first period.
On his first NHL goal, he came down and completely blew past Jacob Bryson, walking in on Alex Lyon and beating him on the blocker side.
Later, Tage Thompson turned the puck over along the wall, which the team did all night long. Anthony Mantha wound up with the puck behind the net and found Hayes with a nifty pass. The rookie then ripped it far side over Lyon’s glove.
Hayes is 23-years-old and was on an AHL contract when Pittsburgh signed him in March of 2025.
Pittsburgh's first-round pick in the 2025 NHL Draft, Ben Kindel, had two goals, giving the 19-year-old 14 goals on the season. He was the 11th overall pick in the draft.
Kindel's first goal ended Bryson’s night. He blew a tire, allowing the kid to come down on a 2-on-1 and score a goal that Lyon needed to stop.
Bryson has played very well this season, but this wasn’t his night. He was directly responsible for two of the first three goals-against.
Michael Kesselring came back from being a healthy scratch in Tampa Bay and was on the ice for the first three goals-against.
Lyon wasn’t sharp in this game, and acknowledged that after the loss.
"You want to come up with the big save at the end to keep it at three, and maybe make one of those saves in the first period. Every save and goal can be evaluated for sure, and that’s just my approach," Lyon said during his postgame comments. "You’ve got to be unemotional about it, and when you lose the game, you have to be honest with yourself."
With the score 3-1 in the third period, Tage Thompson brought the puck out from the corner and beat Arturs Silovs with an off-angle shot on the power play.
Teams give the Sabres that lane during every power play, and they do it because they rarely take advantage of it. For the Sabres, it gave them a power play goal in six-straight games, and it gave Thompson his 30th goal of the season.
In 29 games, Thompson has 18 goals and 19 assists for 37 points. He credited his teammates for helping him go on this prolonged bender.
Rasmus Dahlin assisted on the goal, extending his points streak to seven games, where he has 12 points during that streak. Dahlin also has 20 points in his last 16 games.
Jason Zucker has himself ready for every game and period, because he has a knack for scoring early in games and early in periods. He beat Silovs just 1:46 into the game from the left circle on a shot that the Penguins goalie would want back.
Ryan McLeod got an assist on Zucker’s goal, but it was in the winger's skates that made it happen. McLeod now has 21 assists and 27 points in his last 28 games.
This was the third time since Buffalo lost to the Montreal Canadiens on Jan. 31 that the Sabres blew a chance to jump into second place in the Atlantic Division. Instead, the loss dropped Buffalo down to the first Wild Card spot in the Eastern Conference with a points percentage of .614.
It’s the first time they’ve lost 3-of-4 games since they lost three in-a-row ending on Dec. 8.
After the game, Isak Rosen, Zach Metsa and Konsta Helenius were sent to the Rochester Americans.
The Olympic Break has now begun, and I’ll have more coming up on the first 57 games of the season, and will be following Thompson and Dahlin during the Olympics.
The team gets back to practice on Wednesday, Feb. 18. Buffalo's first game action out of the break comes on Feb. 25 in New Jersey against the Devils.
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