Last February, Evander Kane visited his hometown of Vancouver as a Winnipeg Jet.
His homecoming turned into a nasty, embarrassing situation when he had his clothes thrown into the shower by then-teammate Dustin Byfuglien. Jets head coach scratched Kane from the lineup and the rest is now history.
Days later, Kane's tumultuous run in The Peg was over. The former Vancouver Giant star needed a break from Byfuglien and the Jets, and they from him.
Enter Sabres GM Tim Murray who gladly made a trade for Kane and Zach Bogosian.
Winnipeg's loss has been Buffalo's gain.
Sabres fans don't care enough to give a rip about what transpired between Kane and his former Jets teammates. Kane has moved on and he has been a productive player that dare I say has already exceeded all of the lofty expectations that were placed in him the minute the blockbuster trade went down between the Sabres and Jets.
Evander, 24, has been a model citizen in Buffalo. He's one of the elder statemen on the young Sabres team which is one of the youngest teams in teh NHL with an average age of 21.
Kane missed 10 games in November due to an MCL issue in his knee. Now that he has headed, Kane has recorded seven points (5G, 2A) in his last six games and will be screaming with a vengeance against Ryan Miller and the Canucks tonight.
Kane is an integral leader on Buffalo's top line which also features Ryan O'Reilly and Samson Reinhart. For teh past two weeks the Kane-ROR-Reinhart line has been one of the most productive and effective trios in the NHL.
O’Reilly has six points (2G, 4A) in his last six games.
O’Reilly (21:51) leads all NHL forwards in average ice time per game and Kane (21:06) ranks third. O’Reilly skated a career-high 26:14 on Tuesday at Detroit.
With a combined 16 goals through Buffalo’s first 27 games, Jack Eichel (9) and Sam Reinhart (7) are currently on pace to become the second pair of rookies in Sabres history to each record 20 goals in the same season. The other pair was Danny Gare (31) and Peter McNab (22) in 1974-75.
If they maintain their current pace, Eichel (9+5) and Reinhart (7+3) would also be the first pair of Sabres rookies to surpass the 30-point mark since Thomas Vanek (48) and Jason Pominville (30) did so in 2005-06.
Kane-O'Reilly-Reinhart are a formidable trio and will give the Canucks all they can handle in all three zone tonight.
The Canucks are mired in a five game winless streak right now. They were trucked 4-0 by Boston over the weekend. Their head coach Willie Desjardins was not complimentary of his team's listless performance.
The Sabres will want to get pucks in behind the Canucks D then hammer away at their D with heavy fore check pressure.
The Canucks will also want to PK perfectly tonight because Buffalo's power play is now 19-for-86 (22.1%) this season, ranked sixth in the NHL. Buffalo last finished a season above 20 percent on the power play in 2008-09 (21.0%).
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Prior to puck drop tonight, the Canucks will hold a pre-game ceremony with members of the famed West Coast Express line – Naslund, Bertuzzi, and Morrison .
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The Sabres have scored 19 goals in their last five games. Before this five game scoring tear they could only score 6 goals in their previous 6 games from November 14-25.
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Rasmus Ristolainen, the third-year Finnish blue-liner. Ristolainen had eight goals and 20 points in 78 games played last season, and is already up to four goals and 18 points in 27 games played this season. The Sabres will have an even more formidable offensive look from the back end once Cody Franson picks up his game.
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Kane isn't the only Vancouver native who will have friends and family in attendance tonight.
Samson Reinhart grew up in North Vancouver and played for the Kootenay Ice.
Cody Franson, a Sicamous B.C native, played juniors with Kane at the Vancouver Giants.
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Ryan O’Reilly (59.1%) is ranked fourth in the league in faceoff percentage.
O’Reilly also ranks second in the league with 657 faceoffs taken, accounting for 40.6% of Buffalo’s total faceoffs.O’Reilly’s 67.0% win percentage on the power play (77-for-115) ranks first in the league among all players with at least 50 power-play faceoffs taken. He has taken 69.7% of Buffalo’s PP faceoffs.