With the deal of Ilya Lybushkin to the Anaheim Ducks, the Sabres have slightly freed up their defense logjam, leaving eight notable names left on the blueline.
These names include: Rasmus Dahlin, Mattias Samuelsson, Henri Jokiharju, Erik Johnson, Connor Clifton, Jacob Bryson, and Riley Stillman. So that begs the question, how should the Sabres go about the defense pairs?
First and foremost, we should with Owen Power and his partner, because a lot of the offseason should have been geared towards getting a partner specifically to play with him. Brett Pesce, did not happen, but the Sabres did add two quality veteran options in Erik Johnson and Connor Clifton.
Will one of these guys get the crack to play with Power? Maybe.
But maybe, just maybe, the right partner for Power was on the roster the whole time. His name, is Mattias Samuelsson. Yes, Samuelsson spent the majority of his time playing of course with Rasmus Dahlin, but he did see a good sample size with Owen Power as well. The pair played together 114 minutes to be exact, which was good for 10th out of 37 potential combinations of pairs Don Granato used last year, and the pair performed well when used together.
In pairs that played a minimum of 100 minutes, they produced 4.22 GF/60, and 2.64 GA/60, both top three on the team. They also had the third highest xGF/60 with 3.27, and the lowest xGA/60 on the team with 2.11.
The only issue with a potential Power-Samuelsson pair is if the team cares about possibly having two left handed defenseman on one pair, and two righties on another pair.
So if Samuelsson and Power were to get more of a look as a pair, then what happens with Rasmus Dahlin?
This is where you insert Connor Clifton.
The Sabres need Connor Clifton to have a successful season next year, and they need him to work out. I believe the Sabres also signed him because they believe he can handle a bigger role on this team. Clifton spent most of his minutes with Derek Forbort on the bottom pair last season. The rest, were spent with Hampus Lindholm in a clear top-four role, as well as Matt Grezelcyk.
Clifton was serviceable in the first two games of the playoffs, but he had a critical turnover in game six of the first round of the playoffs with the Florida Panthers which helped paved the way for the Panthers to comeback, and was benched for game seven.
Still, Connor Clifton had to help carry the burden when Charlie McAvoy was out of the lineup, and did a solid job holding down the blueline. How much of that was Clifton and how much of it was attributed to playing with Hampus Lindholm? Well to be honest, quite a bit of it probably was Lindholm, but Clifton still complimented him well, and didn’t hurt team when given the opportunity to play top-four minutes.
With that in mind, Rasmus Dahlin is so good, that the same rule applies here as it did with Hampus Lindholm. While Clifton may be realistically a tweener defenseman who’s best fit is to move between the second and third pairs, all you have to do when Rasmus Dahlin is your partner is to not hurt the team.
The idea behind Samuelsson and Power as one pair, and Dahlin and Clifton as another pair is the ol’ playoff seeding formula, where your one plays the four, and your two matches the three, and Connor Clifton is currently my fourth seed by comparison.
The question will be, if Connor Clifton pairs up with Rasmus Dahlin, how much offense are you sacrificing?
Last year, Henri Jokiharju was paired with Rasmus Dahlin, and Jokiharju was arguably the fourth best defenseman last year. He played 232 minutes with Dahlin, good for fifth most on the team. The pair accounted for 2.84 GF/60, and 3.36 GA/60, good for 6th and 8th on the team for pairs logging a minimum 100 minutes, out of eleven qualifying pairs. Dahlin and Jokiharju had the highest expected goals per 60, and the second lowest goals against per 60, but of course, the actual goals forward and against fell below expectation.
Jokiharju did perform better with Owen Power, but it was against lesser competition, and not the top line competition Rasmus Dahlin faces. Power and Jokiharju had the second highest GF/60 with 3.25, but also recorded a 3.25 GA/60. They performed above their expected GF with an xGF of 2.69, and 3.26 xGA/60.
Either way, Henri Jokiharju needs a lesser role, and the bottom pair, where I think he would thrive.
I believe Connor Clifton is a clear upgrade over Jokiharju, but it’s just a matter of, are you going to sacrifice any offense with him on the ice next to Rasmus Dahlin?
This is where it’s honestly tough to say. Because he did perform well with Lindholm in Boston. They recorded the highest xGF on the team with 3.29, and the lowest xGA with 2.08 using the same criteria. However, he played a good amount of time with Matt Grzelcyk as well, and the were statistically the worst pair on the team.
Of course, it would probably take a deeper dive to determine why the Greczlyk-Clifton pair struggled when used as a pair.
Then that brings us to the bottom pair, and the bottom pair also needs to provide depth. The Sabres struggled not just because Samuelsson is so good, but they also struggled because they simply lacked the depth on the blue. They were in a heap of trouble when any top four defenseman missed time.
After pairing Clifton and Dahlin and Power with Samuelsson, the two top defenseman left over are Erik Johnson and Henri Jokiharju. More than likely here, Jokiharju would have to switch to his off-side on the left.
Erik Johnson is not what he used to be, but I still expect would likely function as a stabilizing veteran presence for any of the Sabres blueliners, and will likely move all over the lineup. That’s how Colorado used him last season. He played 328 minutes with Samuel Girard, 153 minutes with Devon Toews, and 104 with Bowen Byram.
I’m expecting Erik Johnson to play most of his minutes with Jokiharju, as well as move up the lineup when needed to play with Owen Power, and possibly Rasmus Dahlin. I wouldn’t be surprised if he played quite a bit with Mattias Samuelsson as well.
Overall, i’m expecting both Johnson and Clifton to drastically improve the Sabres defense as a whole with the depth they will provide. Both players should provide more physical play to the blueline and the team, and both guys should block quite a few shots, an element drastically missing from last year’s team.
Riley Stillman should be in the 7th defenseman role, and will play a physical energetic game when called upon, and Jacob Bryson is 8th in the pecking order. In terms of depth, Bryson should be respectable, as long as you don’t need to play him much.
It is possible former first round pick, Ryan Johnson earns a call-up during the season.
The Sabres boast plenty of size on the back end as well, now that they’ve added Erik Johnson to the group below:
Dahlin: 6’3 207
Power: 6’6 213
Johnson: 6’4 225
Samuelsson: 6’4 227
Then of course you have Connor Clifton, who is only 5’11 190, but plays like he is 6’4 220, and hits like a truck.
Regardless of what the Sabres defense pairs are next season, overall, i’m expecting the blueline to be a lot more physical, and tougher to play against as a unit. But if things go south early on, i’d expect the Sabres to be working the phones by the trade deadline, if they are in a playoff race.
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