Next Season’s Big Challenge

[BullBuchanan]

22 hours ago, Porous Five Hole said:

Can you expand on this? To me, meaningful returns is exactly what we are getting from the blue line. It’s the backbone of the team.
 

Both game seven goals came from the blue line (unless Greenway’s pants got credited). The Sabres were a bounce away from the Conference Final and rolling our top four D was a mismatch nightmare for two playoff series. Buffalo was better 5 on 5 and the blue line was the reason.
Also, seven guys scored three or more goals this playoffs, and half of our top six were three of those seven.  

Happy to expand on it. We allowed 3.00 GA/GP in the playoffs which was 8th/16, yet we spent the 5th most in the entire league on defense this year. The only playoffs teams that spent more are MTL, MIN, DAL. By comparison, Carolina spent the 24th most in the league on defense and have allowed just 1.78 GA/GP in the playoffs.

If we look at the regular season, Buffalo compares more favorably, coming in at the 22nd most goals allowed/game, but still behind Carolina and the Flyers who spend near the bottom of the league. 

A TON of our goals against in the playoffs were a result of sloppy defensive play, passing through our own slot, which only stopped in the last two games, and not being physical in front of the net.

We don't have Andrei Vasilevskiy in net, that's clear. If you're not going to have a guy like that, your defense needs to compensate, and ours was not up for the task at all. Did you not watch Owen Power stand static in the crease while someone passed right through him for a goal? I did.

Power is a good player, So is Muel, Byram, and Dahlin is certainly great. As a unit however, they are less than the sum of their parts. They are great are scoring goals, but not so great actually playing defense.

Edited May 23 by BullBuchanan

[BullBuchanan]

23 hours ago, dudacek said:

Curious how many times you've watched Mrtka play?

I've watched his Sabre preseason games which were promising, a bit of his World Juniors, which was just OK and one live junior game where he was a JAG.

His numbers  in junior were fine, but he didn't progress statistically at all.

He's a very big kid who skates really well and he will play in the NHL simply because of that. But to me he has a lot to learn about how to play hockey before he could even be considered on upgrade on, say Connor Timmins at the NHL level.

He's got Samuelsson potential in there, but it took Samuelsson 7 years to fully unlock that potential, and that's not unusual for talented young defencemen, particularly large ones without elite puck skills.

As for the bold, the defence corps is the single biggest reason this team won the division and was a goal way from the final four.

That's because we were relying on our defense for offense, instead of relying on them to shut games down. Our defense left our goalies exposed constantly. Our tendies didn't help matter by getting rattled and letting in softies, but you can't allow 3 GA/G and expect to win the cup.

[Taro T]

12 minutes ago, BullBuchanan said:

Happy to expand on it. We allowed 3.00 GA/GP in the playoffs which was 8th/16, yet we spent the 5th most in the entire league on defense this year. The only playoffs teams that spent more are MTL, MIN, DAL. By comparison, Carolina spent the 24th most in the league on defense and have allowed just 1.78 GA/GP in the playoffs.

If we look at the regular season, Buffalo compares more favorably, coming in at the 22nd most goals allowed/game, but still behind Carolina and the Flyers who spend near the bottom of the league. 

A TON of our goals against in the playoffs were a result of sloppy defensive play, passing through our own slot, which only stopped in the last two games, and not being physical in front of the net.

We don't have Andrei Vasilevskiy in net, that's clear. If you're not going to have a guy like that, your defense needs to compensate, and ours was not up for the task at all. Did you not watch Owen Power stand static in the crease while someone passed right through him for a goal? I did.

Power is a good player, So is Muel, Byram, and Dahlin is certainly great. As a unit however, they are less than the sum of their parts. They are great are scoring goals, but not so great actually playing defense.

And that awesome Canes D is giving up 6 GA/G to the Habs and the Sabres didn't even give up 4GA/G to them.

Sometimes the opponent matters.

[K-9]

16 minutes ago, Taro T said:

And that awesome Canes D is giving up 6 GA/G to the Habs and the Sabres didn't even give up 4GA/G to them.

Sometimes the opponent matters.

It’s difficult to argue with stats in a vacuum and people can make them say whatever they want them to say as the saying goes. 

[BullBuchanan]

50 minutes ago, Taro T said:

And that awesome Canes D is giving up 6 GA/G to the Habs and the Sabres didn't even give up 4GA/G to them.

Sometimes the opponent matters.

The canes also performed better in the regular season. Ignore the reality if it helps, but our inability to stop the other team is why our guys are shopping for new golf clubs right now.

32 minutes ago, K-9 said:

It’s difficult to argue with stats in a vacuum and people can make them say whatever they want them to say as the saying goes. 

Find me that stats that prove we had a shutdown defense this year then. In the playoff games we lost this year, we would have needed to score: 5(BOS),2(BOS),6(MTL), 6(MTL), 7(MTL) 3(MTL). We were already the 5th highest scoring team in the playoffs at 3.31, so if next year's plan is to get 6 or 7 goals a game to turn losses into wins, I don't think that's gonna work.

Edited May 23 by BullBuchanan

[K-9]

14 minutes ago, BullBuchanan said:

The canes also performed better in the regular season. Ignore the reality if it helps, but our inability to stop the other team is why our guys are shopping for new golf clubs right now.

Find me that stats that prove we had a shutdown defense this year then. In the playoff games we lost this year, we would have needed to score: 5(BOS),2(BOS),6(MTL), 6(MTL), 7(MTL) 3(MTL). We were already the 5th highest scoring team in the playoffs at 3.31, so if next year's plan is to get 6 or 7 goals a game to turn losses into wins, I don't think that's gonna work.

Please define “shutdown” defense. Because if you are going to exclude the forwards as part of the defensive equation, then we really don’t have much to discuss. 

Are you confining the stats solely to the playoff sample size because your question asks about “this year?”  Several advanced stat metrics indicate the Sabres were one of the best defensive teams in the league over the course of the season. 

As bad as you want to paint our D game, we were one goal away from being in Carolina in a game we dominated, largely due to the play of our D corp. 

[thewookie1]

29 minutes ago, BullBuchanan said:

The canes also performed better in the regular season. Ignore the reality if it helps, but our inability to stop the other team is why our guys are shopping for new golf clubs right now.

Find me that stats that prove we had a shutdown defense this year then. In the playoff games we lost this year, we would have needed to score: 5(BOS),2(BOS),6(MTL), 6(MTL), 7(MTL) 3(MTL). We were already the 5th highest scoring team in the playoffs at 3.31, so if next year's plan is to get 6 or 7 goals a game to turn losses into wins, I don't think that's gonna work.

Defenseman /= Shut down Defense

Shutting down your opponent requires all 5 skaters to buy in as well as carry through all the time. 
 

Our team still makes mistakes but it’s not purely due to ineptitude. Sometimes it’s merely bad luck or a slight error leading to trying to blow the zone a fraction too early. There isn’t a perfect defensive team in the league. Even the much lauded Hurricanes looked even more inept than we ever did in Game 1. Miller literally abandoned his position to attempt a Hit and let Danault get a full breakaway. 
 

You pay players based on their performance and their impact on 200ft of the ice. Our Defense may make a hefty sum but they also create a massive impact to our offense and possession. We don’t have 4 Darnell Nurses or the like. We actually have a nice mix of offensive and defensive skills between the 4.

[dudacek]

2 hours ago, BullBuchanan said:

That's because we were relying on our defense for offense, instead of relying on them to shut games down. Our defense left our goalies exposed constantly. Our tendies didn't help matter by getting rattled and letting in softies, but you can't allow 3 GA/G and expect to win the cup.

We absolutely depend on our defencemen for offence. And our forwards for defence.

Hockey is not football, it requires a five-man unit working together in all 3 zones.

Doesn’t matter who is blocking the shots, or getting them through, or if you win 4-3 or 2-1. It just matters if you win.

The bold is hyperbole. The team (meaning not just the blueliners) didn’t play its best defence against Montreal overall, but over the course of the past 5 months it has been very good overall. Second best in the league good.

Individually, the Sabres top 4 were all positive in terms of their playoff GF share, shot share and xG analytics - save Byram’s 49.5% xG - in many cases by a wide margin.

You seem to be looking at their play through a very narrow lens, and even through that frame are missing the mark.

Edited May 23 by dudacek

[BullBuchanan]

21 minutes ago, dudacek said:

We absolutely depend on our defencemen for offence. And our forwards for defence.

Hockey is not football, it requires a five-man unit working together in all 3 zones.

Doesn’t matter who is blocking the shots, or getting them through, or if you win 4-3 or 2-1. It just matters if you win.

The bold is hyperbole. The team (meaning not just the blueliners) didn’t play its best defence against Montreal overall, but over the course of the past 5 months it has been very good overall. Second best in the league good.

Individually, the Sabres top 4 were all positive in terms of their playoff GF, shot share and xG analytics - save Byram’s 49.5% xG - in many cases by a wide margin.

You seem to be looking at their play through a very narrow lens, and even through that frame are missing the mark.

Quite the opposite. I'm looking how the roster is constructed and where the gaps in our play are compared to other teams. Our defenseman excel in offense and the forecheck. We looked worse than bothe Boston and MTL in our end IMO, and this was even true during he regular season. We replied on our offense to carry us.

I don't think this is a team designed to win close games.

59 minutes ago, thewookie1 said:

Defenseman /= Shut down Defense

Shutting down your opponent requires all 5 skaters to buy in as well as carry through all the time. 
 

Our team still makes mistakes but it’s not purely due to ineptitude. Sometimes it’s merely bad luck or a slight error leading to trying to blow the zone a fraction too early. There isn’t a perfect defensive team in the league. Even the much lauded Hurricanes looked even more inept than we ever did in Game 1. Miller literally abandoned his position to attempt a Hit and let Danault get a full breakaway. 
 

You pay players based on their performance and their impact on 200ft of the ice. Our Defense may make a hefty sum but they also create a massive impact to our offense and possession. We don’t have 4 Darnell Nurses or the like. We actually have a nice mix of offensive and defensive skills between the 4.

Our defenseman get bullied in their own zone, and are routinely unable to clear effectively. We all watched for the last two months.

Am I the only one who saw it?

Edited May 23 by BullBuchanan

[Porous Five Hole]

3 hours ago, BullBuchanan said:

Happy to expand on it. We allowed 3.00 GA/GP in the playoffs which was 8th/16, yet we spent the 5th most in the entire league on defense this year. The only playoffs teams that spent more are MTL, MIN, DAL. By comparison, Carolina spent the 24th most in the league on defense and have allowed just 1.78 GA/GP in the playoffs.

If we look at the regular season, Buffalo compares more favorably, coming in at the 22nd most goals allowed/game, but still behind Carolina and the Flyers who spend near the bottom of the league. 

A TON of our goals against in the playoffs were a result of sloppy defensive play, passing through our own slot, which only stopped in the last two games, and not being physical in front of the net.

We don't have Andrei Vasilevskiy in net, that's clear. If you're not going to have a guy like that, your defense needs to compensate, and ours was not up for the task at all. Did you not watch Owen Power stand static in the crease while someone passed right through him for a goal? I did.

Power is a good player, So is Muel, Byram, and Dahlin is certainly great. As a unit however, they are less than the sum of their parts. They are great are scoring goals, but not so great actually playing defense.

To me, goaltending was a much bigger problem than the blue line. But to each their own. 

[thewookie1]

53 minutes ago, BullBuchanan said:

Quite the opposite. I'm looking how the roster is constructed and where the gaps in our play are compared to other teams. Our defenseman excel in offense and the forecheck. We looked worse than bothe Boston and MTL in our end IMO, and this was even true during he regular season. We replied on our offense to carry us.

I don't think this is a team designed to win close games.

Our defenseman get bullied in their own zone, and are routinely unable to clear effectively. We all watched for the last two months.

Am I the only one who saw it?

Who the hell bullied us in the past 4 months? Sometimes they may struggle with intense forecheck but that isn't exactly unusual to any team. BOS, MTL, nor TBL bullied us in the slightest; if anything we fought back and got even. Past years for sure we had issues but this year I saw very rarely any issues of that nature in any meaningful frequency. 

[BullBuchanan]

Here's Slafkofsky passing between Muel and Thompson to a wide open Suzuki standing in front of the net (this is a theme) (Save)

Here is Newhook left wide open with no Defense in sight (Stanley) (Save)


Suzuki left wide open again in front of the net while defense chases demidov and Lyon makes another save (Theme)(Save)


Here we have Byram passing right into the slot to a wide open Newhook (Theme) (Goal)

https://www.nhl.com/ppt-replay/goal/2025030213/326

In the first period of that game they could have scored 9 goals. which were mostly wide-open shots on the net. Lyon is the only reason they didnt.

They did this stuff in the regular season too. They just didn't have to play Montreal every night.

 

[BullBuchanan]

12 minutes ago, thewookie1 said:

Who the hell bullied us in the past 4 months? Sometimes they may struggle with intense forecheck but that isn't exactly unusual to any team. BOS, MTL, nor TBL bullied us in the slightest; if anything we fought back and got even. Past years for sure we had issues but this year I saw very rarely any issues of that nature in any meaningful frequency. 

Don't take my statement out of context. We had problems with all three of those teams defensively in the regular season.

[thewookie1]

1 minute ago, BullBuchanan said:

Here's Slafkofsky passing between Muel and Thompson to a wide open Suzuki standing in front of the net (this is a theme) (Save)

Here is Newhook left wide open with no Defense in sight (Stanley) (Save)


Suzuki left wide open again in front of the net while defense chases demidov and Lyon makes another save (Theme)(Save)


Here we have Byram passing right into the slot to a wide open Newhook (Theme) (Goal)

https://www.nhl.com/ppt-replay/goal/2025030213/326

In the first period of that game they could have scored 9 goals. which were mostly wide-open shots on the net. Lyon is the only reason they didnt.

They did this stuff in the regular season too. They just didn't have to play Montreal every night.

 

 

That's playing bad positionally or over committing sometimes. It also can be system breakdowns caused by their own game plan; they want to shoot the zone to get speed and numbers up ice. If the other team makes a play or the Sabres player bobbles the puck you can easily get stuff like #1 there. MTL wasn't much better if at all only their screw ups tended to be more due to their man to man breaking down or due to our forecheck breaking their out near their blueline. Our blueline has a major influence on our possession whereas MTL is less so. All advantages comes with disadvantages, we have a highly mobile and dynamic defense that can generate offense entirely on its own and create mismatches but will also occasionally hiccup with overly aggressive playing. Everything is a trade off, those sorts of turnovers tail off greatly if we have a lead in the 3rd because the team tends to rein in the aggression a tad more and leave more backline coverage. Do that too much however and you go Alamo mode.     

Just now, BullBuchanan said:

Don't take my statement out of context. We had problems with all three of those teams defensively in the regular season.

And they had trouble with our style of offense as well..... you can't be everything simultaneously 

[dudacek]

17 minutes ago, BullBuchanan said:

Here's Slafkofsky passing between Muel and Thompson to a wide open Suzuki standing in front of the net (this is a theme) (Save)

Here is Newhook left wide open with no Defense in sight (Stanley) (Save)


Suzuki left wide open again in front of the net while defense chases demidov and Lyon makes another save (Theme)(Save)


Here we have Byram passing right into the slot to a wide open Newhook (Theme) (Goal)

https://www.nhl.com/ppt-replay/goal/2025030213/326

In the first period of that game they could have scored 9 goals. which were mostly wide-open shots on the net. Lyon is the only reason they didnt.

They did this stuff in the regular season too. They just didn't have to play Montreal every night.

 

You do realize that you can pick out 4 random scoring chances against every team in any game?

There’s going to be a dozen of them in the very best defended games.

Thats how hockey works. It’s a high speed game of breakdowns and 50/50 battles. You minimize breakdowns, you don’t eliminate them. You try to win the majority of 1-on-1 battles, you can’t win them all.

I’ll say it again, from Dec. 9 onward the Sabres defended better than all but one NHL team.

That’s not an opinion you can disagree with, it’s fact.

https://www.nhl.com/stats/teams?reportType=game&dateFrom=2025-12-09&dateTo=2026-04-17&gameType=2&sort=a_goalsAgainstPerGame&page=0&pageSize=50

 

Edited May 23 by dudacek

[BullBuchanan]

1 minute ago, thewookie1 said:

 

That's playing bad positionally or over committing sometimes. 

That "sometimes" has consistently been occurring for years. Power standing between two players while a dangerous chance on goal goes right through him is a hallmark of his. This one didn't even go in, but there's another brutal one this series that did.

1 minute ago, dudacek said:

You do realize that you can pick out 4 random scoring chances against every team in any game?

There’s going to be a dozen of them in the very best defended games.

Thats how hockey works. It’s a high speed game of breakdowns and 50/50 battles. You minimize breakdowns, you do t eliminate them. You try to win the majority of 1-on-1 battles, you can’t win them all.

Ill say it again, from Dec. 9 onward the Sabres defended better than all but one NHL team.

That’s not an opinion you can disagree with, it’s fact.

https://www.nhl.com/stats/teams?reportType=game&dateFrom=2025-12-09&dateTo=2026-04-17&gameType=2&sort=a_goalsAgainstPerGame&page=0&pageSize=50

 

Fine, then I guess nothing matters. Do nothing, but expect better results.

[BullBuchanan]

3 minutes ago, dudacek said:

I’ll say it again, from Dec. 9 onward the Sabres defended better than all but one NHL team.

That’s not an opinion you can disagree with, it’s fact.

https://www.nhl.com/stats/teams?reportType=game&dateFrom=2025-12-09&dateTo=2026-04-17&gameType=2&sort=a_goalsAgainstPerGame&page=0&pageSize=50

 

 Cool, now do playoffs. That's a fact too.

[thewookie1]

1 minute ago, BullBuchanan said:

That "sometimes" has consistently been occurring for years. Power standing between two players while a dangerous chance on goal goes right through him is a hallmark of his. This one didn't even go in, but there's another brutal one this series that did.

Fine, then I guess nothing matters. Do nothing, but expect better results.

No we are just being realistic and know that no system is perfect.

Our team was great this year after Dec. 9th, I have zero interest in gutting the D corp so we can play Boston style, defensive structure > everything else and try to 2-1 win our way past everyone.

[dudacek]

3 minutes ago, BullBuchanan said:

 Cool, now do playoffs. That's a fact too.

So is it a longstanding problem, or just something against Montreal?

Edited May 23 by dudacek

[BullBuchanan]

Just now, thewookie1 said:

No we are just being realistic and know that no system is perfect.

Our team was great this year after Dec. 9th, I have zero interest in gutting the D corp so we can play Boston style, defensive structure > everything else and try to 2-1 win our way past everyone.

Why is that the only option? It's either River Hockey or The Trap? 

It's impossible to still be good offensively while being more defensively responsible and improving our ability to winning one goal games?

Just now, dudacek said:

So is it a longstanding 2-year problem, or just something against Montreal?

It's never not been a problem since at least when Power was drafted, and I remember it being a problem going back to Dahlin's draft. before then, who knows? I checked out for a few of those dark years.

[thewookie1]

Just now, BullBuchanan said:

Why is that the only option? It's either River Hockey or The Trap? 

It's impossible to still be good offensively while being more defensively responsible and improving our ability to winning one goal games?

But we were good at defending 1 goal leads both in the regular season and playoffs.....

The group we have will improve with experience as well as with the forwards doing a better job of consistently helping.

[PerreaultForever]

10 hours ago, tom webster said:

So it’s the Jet’s defense that plays good in the season but goes AWOL in the playoffs? You’re willing to bet seven more years on a thirty-three year old who just had his worst regular season?

Like I said, you may be right but it comes with a lot of risk,

Well yes, there is risk, but he's the one guy who might be out there that you could take the risk on. I mean if Boston wants to trade us Swayman sure, look into it, but that isn't happening. No other top rated goalie is available. Maybe Helleybuck is. 

[BullBuchanan]

1 minute ago, thewookie1 said:

But we were good at defending 1 goal leads both in the regular season and playoffs.....

The group we have will improve with experience as well as with the forwards doing a better job of consistently helping.

I completely disagree, but I guess we'll find out. Let's check the cup totals in a few years if they just keep running it back.

[PerreaultForever]

8 hours ago, thewookie1 said:

The Olympics and Playoffs are completely different beasts in regards to goaltending.

The Olympics are high tension singular duels between teams of world-class players where 1 game is the entire story.

The Playoffs are a high tension series of games where both sides have time to make full style changes and find a goalie's weakness and proceed to hammer away at it. 

The NHL playoffs tend to be the best at determining the best team each year besides one category more often than not..... goaltending. A mediocre goalie can go on a ridiculous run and win the Cup or a top tier goalie could get torn to shreds almost entirely due to chance. It's the one position that is never truly certain because the better goalie doesn't always win but simultaneously at the extremes tend to be inevitable in their effects. A great goalie can have a bad matchup or a bad goalie can have a great one.

After this past year I can't really trust Hellebuyck to be a goalie that has any hope of living up to his contract. Yet just as likely he could almost magically lock in and win us the Cup. Bobrovsky was terrible in the Playoffs for years and then almost overnight had 3 consecutive strong seasons before reverting to his unreliable self again. 

https://www.hockey-reference.com/players/h/helleco01.html

His best overall run was his first in 17-18 surprisingly whereas his worst was last two seasons. However last year he was a trainwreck versus St.L  and yet won the series and then proceeded to shut out Dallas in the team's only 2 wins of the 2nd Round.

Compare him with Vasilevskiy, https://www.hockey-reference.com/players/v/vasilan02.html and you just end up more confused.

 

Goalies can win or lose you series, but they are also borderline impossible to predict outside the fringes. Hell this year Lyon nearly shut out Boston but gave up 3 on 4 shots to Montreal. 

 

Could Hellebuyck help, certainly; but it would be far from assured and frankly I have a hard time seeing his impact being worth double UPL's contract. Especially when you have to then cut 5mil from the skaters to achieve his acquisition 

 

Well those are all valid points but I'd also say as inconsistent as he was, Florida doesn't win the cup without Bobrovski. Edmonton would have. Switch goalies and Edmonton would have. Would Helleybuck have stopped that shot UPL let in in OT and we'd be in Carolina? I have to think yes, that was a goal a top playoff goalie has to stop. 

As for the money, let me ask you this. If at the beginning of the season you could have traded Tuch for Helleybuck would you have done it? Obviously it's money in one place but you'd have to find a way. Find a way to shed Greenway and UPL or maybe trade Norris somewhere. With all the ELCs on this roster you'd have to think it's not that hard to get done. 

Anyway, it's not likely to happen. I suspect they will roll back the same guys and maybe even ship Levi out of town.

[_Q_]

Oof.  The tard is hard in this thread.