Sabres need to play just like they did in Game 3

Boston, MA (WGR 550) - The Buffalo Sabres practiced in Boston on Saturday getting ready for Game 4 on Sunday afternoon. Buffalo played its best game in Game 3 to take a two games to one lead in the series. Tage Thompson said they knew they had to up their game,

“I think in Game 2 we might have gotten carried away with the emotions a little bit and I think we wanted to make sure between the whistles we were wearing them out and I think a big strength of ours is our speed and getting in on the forecheck and disrupting stuff and that’s how we’re going to get our offense against them, they clog up the neutral zone really well, so all of our offensive looks are going to come from getting below the goal line, hitting their D and causing turnovers down there.

“That’s annoying to play against too when the D have to keep turning back to break out pucks, so keep wearing on them and I thought that was a good way to come out in Game 3.”

Including playoffs Thompson has 42 goals this season, and is on a point per game pace. This season more than any I’ve seen, he’s been doing much more than that. His backchecking is much improved. There have been examples of him busting to get back to break up odd man rushes. He said he believes in doing more than scoring goals,

“I think everyone in the room’s doing it, that’s what it’s going to take to be successful and to go far in playoffs and I think that’s what makes playoffs so exciting is every play matters, you never know what play is going to turn into something or effect something later in the game and individual statistics and points and all that doesn’t mean anything, it’s all about helping the team win and it’s those little things that add up and you have to do it to win games.”

It was Thompson who was camped right in front of Jeremy Swayman taking his eyes away allowing Alex Tuch to score Thursday’s game-winning goal. Lindy Ruff calls it the one-percenters. Thompson’s left winger Peyton Krebs feels like that has been a huge improvement in this team,

“As we’ve grown as a team and as players and grow in age, you realize that those 1% details add up so much, especially in the playoffs, that 1% can make or break a series, it can make or break a game, it all adds up, so I think those little details and ‘Tommer’ has added to his game throughout the years, I’ve tried to do it for myself, ‘Tuchy’ the same way, the whole group, it’s really allowed us to make the game easier on ourselves and score some more goals.”

The Sabres are 0-for-36 on the power play in April, but Ruff thought he saw improvement in Game 3. Thompson said,

“It sucks because you need to score goals, special teams in playoffs are difference makers, that’s how you win games and we need to capitalize and put it into the back of the net and when we start doing that, we’ll take over games even more, but we definitely got looks and started to generate more chances than we have in the past, but I think it’s just going to take one going in for us for us to start to feel it.”

On Saturday Ruff replaced Jack Quinn in the No. 1 unit with Noah Ostlund.

Josh Norris was still not practicing on Saturday. Ruff is still calling him day-to-day.

To nobody’s surprise, Alex Lyon had his own net and will likely start Game 4. Lyon is 1-0 with a 0.81 goals against and .969 save percentage. In six career playoff games he’s 2-2 with a 2.86 goals against and .906 save percentage.

Overall the Sabres are fifth in the playoffs in goals against at 2.67. Buffalo is fifth in goals at 3.00

Join Brian Koziol and Owen Parker for pregame on Sunday starting at 11:00 from Hamburg Taproom when you’ll hear from Ruff, Marco Sturm, Thompson and Krebs.