There’s bad, and then there’s bad, and tonight the Buffalo Sabres were whichever one of those is worse. The Sabres were outshot by the Toronto Maple Leafs 37-10 en route to a 4-0 drubbing at the hands of their division rivals.
How pathetic was Buffalo’s offense? The Sabres managed just ten total shots in the entire game – posting their lowest shot total EVER and becoming the first team since 2008 to manage such a low shot toal – as they were shut out by the not-very-good Leafs 4-0. Their offense was so anemic that Jonathan Bernier earned a shutout and wasn’t even named one of the top three stars.
“That was an embarrassing effort,” said Captain Obvious Tyler Myers, adding that the Sabres have hit “rock bottom.” In game ten. Before the trade deadline. And before they send Sam Reinhart and Nikita Zadorov, two of their most promising youngsters, back to juniors.
Rock bottom? Let me hand you a shovel, Mr. Myers.
Whether you like the idea of tanking or not, we all know that this season is about being bad enough to get the best draft pick, something I think most people on this board agree with. But this level of offensive abomination is simply sad to watch. At some point, guys like Drew Stafford and Matt Moulson will start scoring goals (we hope) but in the immediate future, let’s try for 20 shots, huh?
Things just keep getting better as the Sabres take on the Bruins at home this Thursday.
Three Questions
1. Whose special teams units will come out on top?
The Leafs went one for six on the power play, while holding Buffalo once again scoreless with the man advantage.
2. Will Michal Neuvirth continue to force the coaches to play him?
Neuvirth played very well in the first two periods, but fell apart in a big way over the final 20 minutes. Expect Jhonas Enroth to get the next few starts.
3. Are the Cody Hodgson and Marcus Foligno at center experiments over?
Yes, as they should be. Neither are defensively responsible enough to handle the middle, and besides, the Sabres need room for all their future superstar centers *sob*.
Comment of the Game
Seriously
People have to realize that whether they’ve “embraced the tank” or not, the organization has. There’s a reason Ted Nolan is the coach, Benoit, Weber and Meszaros get trotted out there every night for way too many minutes and a lot of our prospects who are “close” aren’t on the team right now. The team’s front office has deliberately put together a shit team for the express purpose of maximizing the value of our draft picks.
Get us the 30th spot, Nolan gets fired and replaced by a non-Jurassic hockey coach, McEichel, the Pysyk’s and McCabe’s and Larssons and Grigorenkos come up and take the place of the Weber’s and Meszaros and Mitchells and Folignos and suddenly you have a competitive hockey team. Its not going to be a cup winner next year but I legitimately wouldn’t be surprised if they were a back end playoff team with just those entirely reasonable few changes.
There is a lot of fodder on this team, by design. You don’t get 30th by going halfway. Just relax.
What doesn’t kill me only makes me tired.
@pjtopor
This is an excellent point, and one that will need to be brought up over and over again this year, if only to keep us all sane. The Sabres do have the #1 prospect pool, by most evaluations, and that’s before their three first rounders this year.