Taro T

They still have Houser, right? And Ratzlaff could be good for a couple game emergency call up. But, yeah, Sandstrom is scary bad right now.

Tullio giving a Wing the business after driving him into his own net and onto the ice prone. Looks like coincidental roughing penalties.

Probably. So it is 3-2 bad guys? (Again, didn't see the 2nd and am not getting any sound (but am watching football now, so don't care that there isn't sound).)

Sandstom doing Sandstrom things. 84 for Detroit brought the puck into the zone and was surrounded by 4 Sabres. Let a shot fly from near the BL that went through the wickets. It MIGHT've been tipped; but if it was it was still about 12' inside the BL with plenty of time for him to react to it. (And not positive it was deflected.)

And Sabres going back to the PP as a Wing got his skate caught up w/ Prow as he tried to carry the puck out of the zone. Hopefully this goes better than the last PP.

And Detroit scores again on a partial breakaway shorthanded. Didn't watch the 2nd, so no idea what the score is. Each team has scored at least twice.

Probably the same thing that happened when Miller grew up and Biron was relegated back to his rightful spot as the best backup in the NHL from the late 90's to the mid 00's.

After 1, Sabres up 2-1. Slaggart and Neuchev. Sandstrom (shockingly) made some real nice saves after giving up a goal on the Wings 1st shot. Would say the Sabres have been the better team so far; but Detroit has gotten a few really good looks.

Yup. The guy that singlehandedly saved the Swamp Cats season that year giving Bob the chance to get them into the Finals that season. Guess the horse shoe is no longer lodged up his arse.

Neuchev finishing off the goal after a nice steal by Rosen (?). 2-1 Sabres.

Helenius tripped up coming through the neutral zone with no call led to a real dangerous 3 on 1 Wing rush which shockingly Sandstrom stopped while giving up no rebound. (Baby steps continuing.)

Well, yes. Sabretooth is in Prague (or on his way to Prague quite soon after hanging out at Oktoberfest) with the rest of the "real" Sabres. But it's a once in a lifetime opportunity for all the Sabres AHLers (up and comers and lifers, too) to get to pretend they're REALLY Sabres for one final night. Surprised they didn't bump Don Stevens up to do the pbp.

Rathbone continues his strong play of this preseason. He looks like he'll be a good signing for Ra-cha-cha.

Sandstrom has at least A save now. (Baby steps.)

Wow. Even the Moose gets to wear Sabres colors today. Not sure that I've ever seen that before. Lyon thwarted a real nice chance by Tullio set up alone in front off a nice feed from Murray.

1 - 1. Slaggart on a nice rush. Drove the net and put it over Lyon.

Very tough attempt to stop for Sandstrom, but even if it was an easy one the Wings would be up 1 zip right now. Abot 1 minute into the game. At least there's no sound to go with it.

3. (Well, most all of them, all except Dahlin (1), Tuch (2), McLeod (2), Greenway (2), and Zucker (2).) And the regular NHLers usually play 2-3 games in a normal preseason. It's just in this one, because of the trip to Europe, instead of having 2 NHL lines, 2 AHL lines and a mix and match of NHLers and AHLers on D and in net; all 20 guys expected to be playing in the NHL together actually played together.

No reason other than the league's seeming obsession with trying to avoid the NFL as much as they possibly can.

Would say Kulich and Rousek are on this trip because should an entire line get food poisoning the night before one of the Joisey games the team needed enough bodies to fill in. Why Kulich and Rousek? Because of the Amerks they are the guy closest to grabbing a top 6 role and the guy closest to grabbing a bottom 6 role respectively so should a 2nd F get injured after Krebs slips into the lineup one of these 2 do as well and it's a matter of who got hurt to determine which one slides into the lineup. Who else would've been next man up if not those 2? Rosen? Murray? Really doubt it personally.

Would say there is a 3rd item which is actually more necessary than your 2nd item (which is also important): get actual good goaltending. If UPL plays like he did in January and February and Levi plays like he did after he got called back up for the final stretch then this team WILL make the playoffs unless they hit a '73-'74 Sabresesque level of injuries. You mention it at the end of your post; but it is too important not for it to be a major focus this season and is a big reason why they upgraded Comrie to Reimer. GTing is too important to the end results to leave it to just 2 guys when a single injury could derail either for a month or more. And if either play like he did last preseason (UPL) or early last season (Levi) and the season is derailed anyhow. They CAN'T count on 92 or 93 points being good enough to get it. It could be; but it would be foolhardy to be expecting it. They need to be shooting for 98-99 at a bare minimum and realistically should be gunning for higher than that. 99 will effectively guarantee they get in; only 1 team in the modern era ever reached 0.600 and failed to get it. 98 rounds to 0.600 (but is a smidge below it); 99 gets it done.

Was hoping they'd continue sort of almost playing nice with each other until after Reimer clears waivers. Then let 'em go scorched earth with each other if they so choose to their cold little hearts contents.

He did. And, it's a big part of why last season was sooooooo maddening. He and Granato expected both that the growth from the previous season would remain linear with minimal adjustments to the personnel and strategy and they also appear to have believed that a 92 point team is a legitimate playoff contender and not one requiring a tremendous amount of luck to go its way to get into the playoffs. And because of both of those expectations, there was little, if any plan B put in beyond the plan A to get them into the playoffs last year. They continued the build (though belatedly) towards the '25-'26 season (HELLOOOOOOO Byram) but didn't make any of the sort of moves they made this year to help last season's team be stronger. There still isn't a lot of depth should injuries or youthfulness cause players they're depending upon to not live up to their internal predictions. But there IS depth at every spot (quite long in the tooth in net, and quite young elsewhere) and they SHOULD be able to still dress a lineup of 20 players each night with an injury in net and up to 2, maybe even 3, injuries elsewhere. So, there is a bit of a plan B for this year right now. Though it still isn't as solid as we'd like and that unused cap space could've been used to shore up depth further. Am really interested in seeing if/how they cut into that cap space this year. They can still do so but we're pretty much at the point where Adams won't be expected to use it until the trade deadline if he doesn't dip into it this week.

Very tough game to have Shakir gimping around on 1 good ankle. He being at 100% would've helped. (Whether it would've helped enough is open for argument, but it would've helped.) And Brady not outthinking himself would have helped even more.

Agree 100%. Seems like completely backwards in their logic. But must have something to do with the way the CI and ESPN+ contracts (and their equivalents in CA) are structured that they can't just let those games be viewed outside their local markets. (Could be something to do with the way the other broadcast contracts are structured, but that seems less likely.)