The Buffalo Sabres struggled to get things going early on Saturday afternoon at KeyBank Center. The Pittsburgh Penguins took it to them early, found the lead early and kept it for practically the entire game.
The Sabres did a good job of battling back throughout the entire game, finding their legs in the second period and scoring a couple of goals to keep things close. Ultimately, all the Penguins had to do was ensure Buffalo doesn't tie things up. They never allowed the Sabres to get back into it and won the game, 3-2.
Let's take a look at three observations from Saturday afternoon's game:
1.) Thompson and Mittelstadt show up again
Surprise, surprise - the young guys kept the Sabres in this one.
That's becoming more of a common theme for the Sabres as of late. Pretty much all their offense lately has come from Tage Thompson and Casey Mittelstadt, along with linemate Rasmus Asplund.
The trio of players came into the game with the highest icetime among current Sabres with 56:55 played at 5-on-5, and all have contributed at least two goals apiece, along with a 53.4% expected goals-for percentage and a 63.6% high-danger scoring chances-for. They've easily shown the most chemistry of any Sabres line at this point of the season.
Mittelstadt, Thompson and Asplund are all young and all have a bright future with the Sabres, and they're making the most of their opportunity at the moment.
2.) Crosby logs another point against the Sabres
What else is new? Sidney Crosby loves to play the Sabres.
Crosby managed to get on the score sheet of a game played against the Sabres once again. It's a thing he's become accustomed to doing since his NHL career began in 2005.
His assist on Bryan Rust's power play goal on Saturday increased his career point total against the Sabres to 71, scoring 23 goals and 48 assists in 46 total games against Buffalo. It's the most amount of points he has against an NHL team that isn't in the NHL's Metropolitan Division.
The Sabres will get another chance to try to keep Crosby off the scoresheet soon enough, but it's doubtful they'll be able to do anything about him. Nothing seems to stop him when it comes to playing the Sabres.
3.) Fogarty replaces Okposo on line with Eakin and Rieder, which went about as expected
Over-and-over again, whether it's former Sabres head coach Ralph Krueger or interim head coach Don Granato, the Sabres continue to ice a Cody Eakin-led line as it's defensive shutdown unit.
Over-and-over again, it continues to go poorly for the Sabres.
Saturday’s pair of Eakin and Tobias Rieder had a new linemate in Steven Fogarty, with Kyle Okposo's season over after suffering a broken bone in his cheek on Thursday night after taking a Matt Irwin puck dump-in to the side of the face.
Fogarty's inclusion on the line did nothing for the defense.
The trio of Eakin, Okposo and Rieder had played 139 minutes at 5-on-5, the most-often played forward line on the Sabres all season. In those minutes, they generated just a 30.8% expected goals-for percentage, going along with an actual goals-for percentage of 27.3%, indicating things are going worse than what they should be going.
If there's a bottom to how low this line can go, it may not have even hit yet, but with Okposo out, it's likely not going to get any better.
Against the Penguins, the trio of Fogarty, Eakin, and Rieder generated just 22.2% of the shot share to go along with 12.84% expected goals-for percentage. While we can't take everything from such a small sample size, it's actually a worse performance than what that line typically brings.
Ultimately, the Sabres need to find a way to mitigate the negatives that the line brings to the game for the Sabres. Even in just 6:25 of ice time, the Sabres struggled.
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The Sabres and the Penguins will be right back at it Sunday afternoon at KeyBank Center in downtown Buffalo. Buffalo has now been officially eliminated from playoff contention, but they still have some games left to go, and they're not entirely meaningless with young talent needing just an opportunity and to get as many minutes as possible before the season draws to a close.
Both teams will convene again at 3 p.m. ET with the Paul William Beltz Postgame Show starting at 2 p.m. ET with Brian Koziol on the radio flagship station of the Sabres - WGR Sports Radio 550.