GDT: Pittsburg Penguins @ Buffalo Sabres 3/27/25 --Yes, Pittsburg --7pm Face off MSG, ESPN + and on the radio

[LGR4GM]

42 minutes ago, SabresBillsFan said:

And the end of season meaningless wins start happening to ***** up their draft position! 

Zach Benson was drafted 13th overall. We can't see where all roads end.

[Doohickie]

Did anyone else think Josh Dunne > Brett Murray?  Dunne just plays with more energy, and more psychosis.

1 hour ago, LGR4GM said:

That song, especially the autotuned lead vocals, hurts my ears.

[PromoTheRobot]

They keep piling up wins! But Reimer was having too good a day so they had to score a few own goals.

[PerreaultForever]

This is like watching preseason meaningless hockey. Remember when the Rochester roster was beating everyone and how optimistic that made you feel? In the end, it was nothing. Pittsburgh looked almost as bad as the Bruins do. 

So all we need is a little more conditioning. Uh huh. 

[PromoTheRobot]

1 minute ago, PerreaultForever said:

This is like watching preseason meaningless hockey. Remember when the Rochester roster was beating everyone and how optimistic that made you feel? In the end, it was nothing. Pittsburgh looked almost as bad as the Bruins do. 

So all we need is a little more conditioning. Uh huh. 

Actually Rochester is kicking AHL ass.

Edited Friday at 05:01 AM by PromoTheRobot

[PerreaultForever]

2 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Actually Rochester is kicking AHL ass.

Yes I know, I just meant it didn't mean anything for the fate of the NHL team. The preseason record was very good but the team still crashed and burned. This late season stuff doesn't mean anything either. 

5 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Actually Rochester is kicking AHL ass.

It will be interesting to see if they can win in the playoffs though. 

[gilbert11]

4 hours ago, SabresBillsFan said:

And the end of season meaningless wins start happening to ***** up their draft position! 

Unfortunately those back-to-back losses to Montreal are huge.  Sabres 9 points back right now.  Had they won both those Montreal games in regulation, they’d be only 6 pts back.

 

But, here we are riding out the schedule of the 14th straight non-playoff season. 

[Sidc3000]

5 hours ago, PromoTheRobot said:

They keep piling up wins! But Reimer was having too good a day so they had to score a few own goals.

Gotta keep him humble

[CallawaySabres]

3 hours ago, gilbert11 said:

Unfortunately those back-to-back losses to Montreal are huge.  Sabres 9 points back right now.  Had they won both those Montreal games in regulation, they’d be only 6 pts back.

 

But, here we are riding out the schedule of the 14th straight non-playoff season. 

And the 13 game losing streak, and the 6 game losing streak, and the 3 game losing streaks, and the goaltending, and the defense, and the power play…

But other than those things, they might have been good enough for 8th.

[LGR4GM]

If Appert runs the pp, he deserves as much ***** as Ellis got. 

[FrenchConnection44]

Once again, meaningless wins. How often have we seen this. Only ruining our draft position. Smh. And giving fans hope they can be decent but they will find a way to disappoint once again next year I’m sure  lol. 

(While the Pens position themselves to land a top player of course. And he’ll probably wind up being a star with their luck.)

This team has to be the greatest flatter to deceive team in all of sports, bar none. Some sports pub / network put out a yearly award for that. If they did, the Sabres would be multi-year champions over the course of the last decade plus. 

[JustOneParade]

8 hours ago, Doohickie said:

Did anyone else think Josh Dunne > Brett Murray?  Dunne just plays with more energy, and more psychosis.

That song, especially the autotuned lead vocals, hurts my ears.

Don’t have much on Dunne to go on yet but agree relative to Murray, who is not a NHL player, and won’t be.

[JohnC]

It's inarguable from a standings standpoint that these end of season games are meaningless. But that doesn't mean that there is no meaning to them. What I'm focusing on is the play of the young players. Are they getting better and playing a more responsible Lindy two-way game? Is our young core, composed of Power, Samuelsson, Quinn, Kulich, JJP, Benson steadily getting better. In general, I would say yes. 

Samuelsson has been the target of a lot of criticism throughout much of the season. Over the past few games, especially when paired with Dahlin, he has played a steady and efficient game. You don't seem to notice him, and for a defenseman that's a good thing. 

The one young player I have been disappointed in this season is Quinn. Yet, recently he has played better. And it shouldn't be a surprise watching Benson play that he has been the most consistent player in that young core. The effort and tenacity never waver. The next step for him is offensive production. As he gets more physically mature, I see him becoming a mainstay player for us. I never thought he could be a first line player but now I'm open to that increased roll. He seems to complement Tage really well.  

Over the last 12 home games the Sabres are 10-2. Over the last 17 home games the Sabres are 13-4. That's a positive sign. And what has become evident with Reimer's recent play is that when the Sabres have gotten quality goaltending, this team is so much better. 

Your record is your record and no "what ifs" can alter it. But "what if" the Sabres didn't have that ugly 13 no-win streak? How much better would our views be on this team? 

[Porous Five Hole]

13-4 in their last 17 at home. I like that trend.  

[Thorner]

3 minutes ago, JohnC said:

But "what if" the Sabres didn't have that ugly 13 no-win streak? How much better would our views be on this team? 

Would we think better of the team if we took a bunch of our losses and switched them to wins? I’d imagine so, yes 

[JohnC]

1 minute ago, Thorner said:

Would we think better of the team if we took a bunch of our losses and switched them to wins? I’d imagine so, yes 

Even within that horrible stretch there were opportunities to turn some losses into loser points. That was a crushing stretch in our effort to break the non-playoff streak. The setback was too far for a fringe playoff team to overcome. Also, the two Colorado losses where we appeared to have the games in hand were tormenting losses for our playoff pursuit. I strongly believe that if this roster had a couple to few more veteran players that the team would have been able to better handle adversity.  

[LGR4GM]

4 minutes ago, JohnC said:

Even within that horrible stretch there were opportunities to turn some losses into loser points. That was a crushing stretch in our effort to break the non-playoff streak. The setback was too far for a fringe playoff team to overcome. Also, the two Colorado losses where we appeared to have the games in hand were tormenting losses for our playoff pursuit. I strongly believe that if this roster had a couple to few more veteran players that the team would have been able to better handle adversity.  

If this roster had even league average goaltending, we'd probably have made it. 

Edited Friday at 12:52 PM by LGR4GM

[JohnC]

3 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

If this roster had even league average goaltending, we'd probably have made it. 

An interesting question is what is the GM going to do on that issue next season? My sense is KA is a status quo guy. I'm just not sure about depending on UPL to be a #1 goalie. And as well as Reimer is playing is he capable of handling a #1 workload? A lot is at stake to get this critical issue right. 

[Thorner]

21 minutes ago, JohnC said:

Even within that horrible stretch there were opportunities to turn some losses into loser points. That was a crushing stretch in our effort to break the non-playoff streak. The setback was too far for a fringe playoff team to overcome. Also, the two Colorado losses where we appeared to have the games in hand were tormenting losses for our playoff pursuit. I strongly believe that if this roster had a couple to few more veteran players that the team would have been able to better handle adversity.  

It’s not that all of those things aren’t true, and then some: the mistake would be enveloping ourselves in so much bias that we can’t see that, upon stepping back our perspective one iota, all other teams could point to mirror images of the same things in their seasons. And there were wins we salvaged from losses. Just the other day against winnipeg Reimer stood on his head against winnipeg. We’ve had late comebacks from the jaws of defeat. 

why shouldn’t the extremity of the losing streak be present? Is it not reflective of the extremity of our youth relative to other teams? As you point out, we need more veteran talent. 

you can just eliminate the losing streak, as I said, you can’t just take a teams’ flaws away. But if we want to be really nice, we can say they “got on a roll” and it was a particular anomaly unlikely to be repeated and we can go ahead and “soften” the losing streak:

over the 13 game stretch we gained 3 points. Keeping in mind our pace aside from that stretch if we eliminate it completely, is 89 points per 82, it would result in 14 points accumulated in said 13 games. 

So, as mentioned, we can’t just eliminate the losses completely and attribute their normal play. EVERY team has a down stretch. But let’s “soften” it. They gained 3, “no losing streak” pace is 14. Split the difference to be nice, let’s give them 6 extra points and said they gained 9 in the stretch. 

they are now pacing as an 83 point team this season 

In year 5 of Adams build

After giving them 3 free wins 

Edited Friday at 01:09 PM by Thorner

[LGR4GM]

2 minutes ago, Thorner said:

It’s not that all of those things aren’t true, and then some: the mistake would be enveloping ourselves in so much bias that we can’t see that, upon stepping back our perspective one iota, all other teams could point to mirror images of the same things in their seasons. And there were wins we salvaged from losses. Just the other day against winnipeg Reimer stood on his head against winnipeg. We’ve had late comebacks from the jaws of defeat. 

why shouldn’t the extremity of the losing streak be present? Is it not reflective of the extremity of our youth relative to other teams? As you point out, we need more veteran talent. 

you can just eliminate the losing streak, as I said, you can’t just take a teams’ flaws away. But if we want to be really nice, we can say they “got on a roll” and it was a particular anomaly unlikely to be repeated and we can go ahead and “soften” the losing streak:

over the 13 game stretch we gained 3 points. Keeping in mind our pace aside from that stretch if we eliminate it completely, is 89 points per 82, it would result in 14 points accumulated in said 13 games. 

So, as mentioned, we can’t just eliminate the losses completely and attribute their normal play. EVERY team has a down stretch. But let’s “soften” it. They gained, 3, “no losing streak” pace is 24. Split the difference to be nice, let’s give them 6 points and said they gained 9 in the stretch. 

they are now pacing as an 83 point team this season 

In year 5 of Adams build

After giving them 3 free wins 

Yea, Adams needs to go. 

[French Collection]

6 minutes ago, JohnC said:

An interesting question is what is the GM going to do on that issue next season? My sense is KA is a status quo guy. I'm just not sure about depending on UPL to be a #1 goalie. And as well as Reimer is playing is he capable of handling a #1 workload? A lot is at stake to get this critical issue right. 

Reimer has been a #1 (40+ games) in 5 of his 15 NHL seasons. He is also 37 years old, so I wouldn’t count on much more than a stopgap type player.

You are right that KA will probably run this roster back and maybe think Levi is ready. He has not addressed goaltending issues in his 5 years and I don’t see him making a bold move.

Goalies are weird, so there is a chance UPL finds some improvement and gets back to average numbers. Many goalies seem to have roller coaster careers and consistency is what separates the great ones.

[bob_sauve28]

13-4-0 at home in last 17 home games. Nice 

[JP51]

I want the best draft position possible... that said... no more tank... young guys need to learn to win... they just do... this was a game I think finally I saw a team skate hard for at least 45 minutes... and dominate... now the Penguins are smallish and really not good... but I dont care... it was fun to see them click... great to see Kozak get another... I just like that kid...  Great to see Kulich look like he can be something that is part of a solution... great to see Riemer battle for every save even up 7-1.... the only not so great was they looked like they were coasting in the 1st half of the 3rd... and Owen Power is just so unaggressive it really hurts his game and the team...  like Cmon man...  you cant be a Defenseman at your size and play like Villie Leino in the corner and in front of the net... 

[Believer]

19 minutes ago, French Collection said:

Reimer has been a #1 (40+ games) in 5 of his 15 NHL seasons. He is also 37 years old, so I wouldn’t count on much more than a stopgap type player.

You are right that KA will probably run this roster back and maybe think Levi is ready. He has not addressed goaltending issues in his 5 years and I don’t see him making a bold move.

Goalies are weird, so there is a chance UPL finds some improvement and gets back to average numbers. Many goalies seem to have roller coaster careers and consistency is what separates the great ones.

Not ready to give up on UPL myself. Doubt KA or a new GM will be either.

Do think it’s interesting Ruff going with Reimer lately. 

No tank. KA and Ruff want to finish the season with as many wins as possible.

As someone posted earlier, absent the 13 game, six game, and several three game losing streaks, the Defense and PP, the Sabres would have likely made the playoffs.

Culture and the lesson of why every game matters during an 82 game season is the point.

100% agree.

Still up to KA to bring in a few veterans with SC experience or for Pegula to replace KA.

Will be a pivotal Sabre offseason, imo.

 

 

[Doohickie]

1 hour ago, JohnC said:

My sense is KA is a status quo guy.

And what makes you think that?

/sarcasm