Game Info
Ottawa Senators (3-2-0) vs Buffalo Sabres (2-4-0)
Puck Drop: 6:45 PM EST | Canadian Tire Centre | Ottawa, ON
TV: MSG
Radio: WGR-550
Know Your Opponent
Ottawa Senators
Record: 3-2-0
Last Game: lost 5-2 to Detroit Red Wings
Division Ranking: 3rd, Atlantic Division
PP: 13th, 22.7%
PK: 18th, 76.2%
What to Watch
1. Another Home Loss
The Sabres did everything but score (more than once, that is) on Monday night against a weakened Montreal Canadiens side that was backstopped by a sensational Jake Allen between the pipes. Now if the Sabres were winning games on the regular and came a cropper against a hot goalie, that would be a different story. However, right now nothing quite seems to be clicking for Buffalo, and that goes for the football team across town as well.
The goals are simply not coming right now, and it’s not necessarily from lack of trying either. The Sabres are 11th in the league in SAT%, top 10 in both shot attempts and missed shots, but crucially only 14th in shots on target per game and 29th in shooting accuracy, the 6.8% mark is the lowest this century for the Sabres, and well below the 11% mark from last season. Some progression to the mean (about 10%) is to be expected, but it cannot come soon enough.
2. First Look At Hottawa
The Sabres are not the only team that has underachieved in recent seasons but comes into this year with growing expectation around a young core that is looking settled and could be challenging for the playoffs. Boosted by new ownership, the Sens fanbase could possibly be even expecting more from their team than the long-weary Buffalo fans going into a new campaign.
Watching their highlights, I can see why. They’ve hit the ground running to start this campaign, and are scoring 4.20 goals per game, good enough for fourth-best in the league. Comparatively Buffalo are wallowing in 28th at 2.17 per game, while the two teams are tied defensively giving up three goals a game.
Getting any kind of points in this game could come down to how much energy the Sabres still have after playing the Habs the night before while the Sens will be well rested having last played on Saturday.
3. Learning On The Fly
A commonly-repeated military adage goes along the lines of “train hard, fight easy”. For the Sabres, the preseason did not appear to fall into the “train hard” category given how this team is struggling to develop any kind of chemistry anywhere on the ice early this season.
With how quickly the games are coming up and the quality of opponents they’re facing, the coaching team is going to have to find out ways to teach quickly and effectively. I’m not advocating table-watching this early in the season, but it certainly starts to weigh on players’ minds pretty quickly to see Buffalo once again propping up the bottom of the Atlantic Division. It certainly affects the fans and the knock-on effect on performances at the KeyBank Center show that quite clearly too.
For more on the Sens, check out Silver Sevens.
Projected Lineups
Buffalo Sabres
Forwards
Jordan Greenway – Tage Thompson – Dylan Cozens
Jeff Skinner – Casey Mittelstadt – Alex Tuch
JJ Peterka – Peyton Krebs – Victor Olofsson
Zemgus Girgensons – Tyson Jost – Kyle Okposo
Defense
Rasmus Dahlin – Mattias Samuelsson
Owen Power – Henri Jokiharju
Connor Clifton – Erik Johnson
Goaltenders: Devon Levi, Eric Comrie, Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen (projected starter)
Ottawa Senators
Forwards
Brady Tkachuk – Tim Stützle – Claude Giroux
Dominik Kubalik – Josh Norris – Drake Batherson
Mathieu Joseph – Ridly Greig – Vladimir Tarasenko
Parker Kelly – Rourke Chartier – Mark Kastelic
Defense
Thomas Chabot – Jakob Chychrun
Jake Sanderson – Travis Hamonic
Erik Brannstrom – Jacob Bernard-Docker
Goaltenders: Joonas Korpisalo, Anton Forsberg
Editor’s Note: In an attempt to simplify things, I’m trying something new this season at Die By The Blade. Instead of posting a separate game preview and open thread, we’re combining the two. Quite frankly, it makes things easier for us so we don’t have to make two separate posts every game day. Also, we’re not trying to make some silly ‘quota’ of posts each month, so there’s really no reason to separate them. Let me know if that makes sense!