The Buffalo Sabres’ first road trip of the season has been a spectacular success to this point with the road team earning all six-out-of-six available points against Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver. The final stop on the team’s western jaunt will be Seattle, where the Sabres will take on the Kraken at 10 pm tomorrow night in the confines of Climate Pledge Arena.
Those who stayed up late on Saturday to watch the blue and gold play against their expansion brothers in Vancouver were treated to perhaps the best game of the road trip so far. The Sabres won that game 5-1 and mostly outplayed the Canucks throughout with the exception of some brief stints in the second period.
There’s a sense that the Sabres have been out-chanced and outplayed frequently so far this season based on the lopsided shots against them in the Calgary game (43 SOG against), the Edmonton game (48 SOG against), and the Florida game (37 SOG against). Interestingly, that narrative doesn’t hold true when looking at the season-to-date through the lens of Corsi-for and Corsi-against. As a brief refresher, Corsi is a shot attempt differential stat that counts shots, blocked shots and missed shots. The Sabres have almost even Corsi-for numbers (58.63) and Corsi-against numbers (58.91) this season at 5-on-5, and they now sit at a very even -.28 overall, according to evolving-hockey. That differential is actually the closest to even among any team in the NHL.
That’s great news for the Sabres when you realize who they’ve played so far this year. Over their first five games the Sabres have beaten three teams with a winning record as well as Connor McDavid’s team. These are very much quality teams. The last team they beat was the Vancouver Canucks, and hoo boy, it’s hard to watch that squad as a Sabres fan without thinking “been there.”
The Canucks were largely listless and disinterested during Saturday’s game which is wild considering it was Vancouver’s home opener after starting their 2022-23 campaign with five straight on the road. The return did not go well as fans serenaded their players with boos and Bronx cheers while also tossing jerseys onto the ice. Toward the end of the game it was fair to wonder whether Bruce Boudreau would still be head coach when the sun rose in the Pacific Northwest on Sunday.
That kind of effort and atmosphere is something that the Sabres have hopefully moved past at this point in their rebuild. The Canucks are 1970 expansion brothers with the Sabres, and like the team in Buffalo, they have not hoisted the ultimate prize in hockey at any point over the past 50+ years, so fans in Buffalo can probably empathize with the situation in Vancouver better than most. To the Canucks fans I say this: may your rebuild be mercifully short and ultimately successful.
From a Buffalo perspective, there was a lot to like about that game, starting with Casey Mittelstadt and his two-assist performance. The Minnesota native first set up Rasmus Dahlin for the defenseman’s fifth goal in as many games before he fed Victor Olofsson for a two-on-one goal that featured some serious burst from #37. This version of Casey Mittelstadt – with five points in five games – is the one fans have been clamoring to see since he appeared at Highmark Stadium with team America in the World Junior Championship back in 2018.
It would also be a mistake to omit the play of veteran Craig Anderson who thankfully got a relatively quiet night in goal with “only” 30 shots on net. Anderson displayed his trademark coolness in the crease which his teammates have no doubt come to expect and appreciate. Like Anderson, Comrie too has been invaluable to his teammates as he’s currently 4th in the NHL in goals saved above expected with 4, according to jfresh hockey.
To be clear (if it needs to be said), Anderson will not finish the season with his .970 save percentage, and Comrie will not finish with a .930 save percentage. We know this. The hope is that the Sabres can get the shots-against volume down to a reasonable 20-to-30 per game rather than the 35+ that the two Sabres netminders have experienced over the early part of the season. A lot of that will depend on whether Don Granato’s top line can contribute positively as a top line, and indications from the Vancouver hint that reuniting Alex Tuch with Tage Thompson may indeed provide a needed spark.
The expected goals for and goals against numbers look similarly nice to these Corsi numbers. So while there was some danger that adding Tuch to the top line would thin out the talent pool too much elsewhere on the forward ranks, the production of Casey Mittelstadt, Rasmus Dahlin and Victor Olofsson has stemmed that tide. It’s also worth mentioning that while the underlying indicators for the top line’s success were there, the end result really wasn’t, with the exception of one goal by Alex Tuch. This line hasn’t truly broken out yet, and when they do – which they will if these underlying metrics hold – then the Sabres could see the flood gates open offensively.
That will be especially important for the Sabres if they aren’t able to limit their chances against as the season progresses, because at least if they’re bleeding chances defensively, they can generate enough offensively to offset their defensive miscues. And if ever there was a game for Donnie Meatballs’s top line to break through, it’s against the Seattle Kraken.
Martin Jones and Philipp Grubauer both sport identical .860 save percentages in the early going. Brutal.
Grubauer is day-to-day meaning it will likely be Jones against the Sabres tomorrow. Forget fancy stats and expected goals when it comes to Jones; it doesn’t matter. Jones hasn’t had a save percentage above .900 in the NHL since 2017-18, and lest you think this is a small sample size calculation, consider the following: Jones has played at least 34 games – and as many as 62 games – in all four seasons following that campaign. The sample size matches the numbers which matches the eye test. He’s really bad.
Bet the over on goals for the Sabres’ top line.
The Sabres are in good shape to connect four wins on this road trip.
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