So the Buffalo Sabres were spanked 9-4 last night. They weren’t outclassed by a Stanley Cup contender, nor were they blown away by a bunch of players having career nights. No, it’s much, much worse than that.
The Sabres were beaten by the Columbus Blue Jackets, one of the worst teams in hockey right now, and they were beaten comprehensively because the visitors simply did the basics, and did them well. They showed up [very important, in case you might have missed that], they chased the puck [yes, it doesn’t just get attracted to the hockey stick by preternatural forces], they crashed the net [why bother moving opponents out of your goalie’s face, they’ll just come right back], and that was it.
With the holiday roster freeze now in place until next Thursday (Dec 28th), the Sabres are not going to be able to make any moves for over a week, which really might be for the best because knee-jerk reactions from the hiding last night are probably going to hurt the team more than help them. But something will have to give, and soon.
However, a lot of the buzz since the end of the game has not been about the loss or even the manner of the defeat, it’s the comments that captain Kyle Okposo made to the media after that thrashing. Now, context is important, because minutes after the game is never a good time to ask for honest and cogent opinions. An emotional loss where the boos rained down pretty much all night long will get to players, as we found out last week with Jordan Kyrou. But when the media walked into the Sabres dressing room last night, only six players were to be seen, and none of the defensemen.
Captain Kyle Okposo, to his credit (for whatever that’s worth nowadays), stood up and made himself available to speak, and might be wishing this morning he didn’t bother especially when he was asked about the booing in the light of the league’s longest playoff drought.
“That’s 12 years for them, for sure. Not all of that’s on us. It’s a lot frustration and that’s understandable. As a group, we bear, obviously, some of that responsibility from tonight. That’s a lot of deep (stuff) that’s pent up in the fans and that’s OK.”
– Kyle Okposo
The immediate reaction to his comments was that Okposo – who has been here for half of the playoff drought – was somehow trying to deflect blame by saying that this team is only responsible for part of where we find this franchise now, and as you can imagine that has not sat well with a lot of the fanbase.
The Sabres are certainly playing like they have given up on the coach, but Okposo was pretty vehement when asked if they had done so.
“Listen, I’m not gonna sit here and bash the coaches. I’m not gonna talk about us quitting. I’m not gonna talk about Donny and us not listening. That’s not right. Donny has our full support. We are going play hard for Donny and that’s it.”
– Kyle Okposo
If that was playing hard for Donny then the coach might as well start packing his bags and calling whatever moving service Ken Dorsey used.
Tage Thompson reiterated his captain’s comments.
“Well, he’s not on the ice playing, right? So that’s on us. He can only do so much. He can put the guys on the ice, he can draw up the system on the boards. But he sends guys over the boards, and if they’re not doing their job, it’s not on him, it’s on us, and everyone in this room knows that. We got to take accountability for that.”
– Tage Thompson
The man himself Don Granato remained as cool as he always is.
“My concern is on making this group better tomorrow. It was my concern from Day One, and it’ll stay my concern. We are going to make this team better. And I said it with absolute respect for our fan base. And when we go to work and I don’t sleep, it’s because of that, we care about that.
“We want to do good on that. And I still can stand here with confidence that we will. This group is resilient. They care. And those two traits will push them through.”
– Don Granato
Now remember just a few days ago Dylan Cozens spoke up after yet another deflating loss and was pretty clear that the Sabres were being bullied on the ice, and word has it that General Manager Kevyn Adams was unhappy with Cozens comments postgame, but later publicly announced that he was okay with what the young forward said. With that in mind, you cannot expect too many players to be willing to speak their minds to the media.
However this ends up shaping up, this is certainly not the Christmas that Sabres fans had envisioned for their team at the beginning of a season that was widely expected to continue into shorts-wearing season.
LINK TO FULL KYLE OKPOSO INTERVIEW