BUFFALO, N.Y. (WKBW) — Despite erasing a third-period deficit, the Buffalo Sabres came up short on Wednesday night, falling to the Boston Bruins 4-3 in overtime. The Sabres now have 10 games left in the regular season and fall to 44-20-7 with the loss.
5 Observations from Wednesday’s loss:
Same result, different night
For the second straight game, the Sabres were trailing in the third period, took a lead, and then lost the game in overtime. If you’re a glass-half-full person, you’ll look at the two points they picked up. Or you can view it as two precious points they let slip away.
I’m somewhere in the middle. I think the Ducks' loss is more acceptable than the Bruins loss. And that’s partly because of two goals allowed that I believe are avoidable. I actually thought Luukkonen played well going into the third period, but he got lost on the game-tying goal. And yes, I recognize it was a weird bounce, but he was pretty out of position. The overtime goal needs to be stopped. Plain and simple.
This was a Boston team that had struggled on the road with a backup goaltender on the second night of a back-to-back. The Sabres let one point slip away in this game and while right now it might not matter, it very well could in a few weeks.
"Those first two periods were probably as sloppy as we've played in months," Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff said.
Zach Benson, man.
That was the tweet when he scored the game-tying shorthanded goal while also drawing a penalty. I simply posted “Zach Benson, man.”
What else can you even say? When the Sabres need a play, his effort seems to will them into making something happen. We saw it against the Los Angeles Kings last week when he took a hit that led to the Sam Carrick game-winning goal.
Then the next night, Benson scored the go-ahead goal against the Ducks.
And tonight he scored on a high-effort play, showing unbelievable patience to tie the game at two. That patience also led Bruins defenseman Mason Lohrei to cross-check Benson into the net, drawing a penalty. The Sabres scored seconds later. In 33 seconds, the Sabres turned a 2-1 deficit into a 3-2 lead because of Benson.
He’s not their most talented player, and he’s almost never talked about outside of Buffalo. But he’s probably their hardest-working guy. And when you combine that with some great vision and a constant motor, you get a hell of a hockey player.
Zucker’s big night
Jason Zucker opened the scoring on the power play in the first period. He was in front of the net connecting on a pass from Tage Thompson.
In the third period, he once again scored on the power play from in front of the net on a pass from Tage Thompson.
Now that’s consistency.
I have been hard on the Sabres power play, but it showed up against the Bruins. Zucker now has 22 goals in 53 games and has been such a solid player for them. He does all of the right things and is the type of guy you want on a team in a push for the playoffs.
Tuch’s costly mistake
In the second period, Alex Tuch had an ugly play at the blue line that immediately led to the Bruins' second goal. He got outmuscled by defenseman Nikita Zadorov, but it looked like Tuch hesitated to get the puck out of the zone in a dangerous area. Zadorov then fed the puck to David Pastrnak, who was poke-checked by Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen. Unfortunately for the Sabres, the puck went right to Viktor Arvidsson.
I understand what Tuch is trying to do, but the risk greatly outweighs the reward in that situation. It was a bit too casual for my liking and an avoidable mistake.
Figuring out the blue line
With the logjam on the Sabres' blue line, Lindy Ruff has a tough decision to make. He essentially has to decide who to play as the Sabres' sixth defenseman. His options are Zach Metsa, Michael Kesselring, Luke Schenn, and Connor Timmins, who returned on Wednesday night.
I thought Timmins was good and played like the guy we saw before his injury. I think he’s a perfectly solid seventh guy and a solid penalty-killer, but Metsa would be my choice to play every night.
He just seems to get the most out of Logan Stanley, who is going to play. I also think Kesselring deserves one more shot. This is a good problem to have, but one the Sabres need to get solved in the next month. I’d imagine we continue to see some sort of rotation to make sure some of the afforementioned names are at least somewhat fresh.
