Buffalo Sabres 23/24 Season Official Thread

[Taro T]

With tonight's regulation loss in Dallas, the Sabres have been officially eliminated from playoff contention for a 13th consecutive season.

 

Though the Sabres can (theoretically, but yeah, right, sure they will) reach 85 points and there are only 8 teams with that many points right now and the Sabres would hold the tiebreaker over that team should they both end up at 85 the Pens and Wings both have 84 points and play each other on Thursday so somebody will end up at 86 by the end of that game.

 

PP went 0-3 in their final ABSOLUTE MUST WIN game.  The PP is 28th.  No idea what 4 teams are even worse than the Sabres PP but technically there are 4 that are even more pathetic.  Matt friggin' Ellis runs that abortion.  If Granato survives the post season review, don't see any way they justify bringing Matt back.  But am 99.99999% sure that he'll be back if Donny's back and have Donny at 99.9% as a lock to be back.

 

Won't happen, but bring in Gerard Gallant as the new coach and Bob Wood as the PP coach.  Can keep Bales and bump Girardi up to bench coach.  Am perfectly fine with sending Christie and Wilford into the sun along with Ellis.  Have one more bench coach - am ok with giving Appert a promotion and finding somebody else to lead Ra-cha-cha if it would take that to keep him in the organization with the rest of this proposed shake up.

[Crap Throwing Clavin]

I'm at the Sabres game, the crowd just started doing the wave, and this must be the fifth circle of hell.

[Taro T]

3 hours ago, Crap Throwing Clavin said:

I'm at the Sabres game, the crowd just started doing the wave, and this must be the fifth circle of hell.

 

WTF were you in Buffalo?  Figured if you were going to watch Caps Sabres live it would be down in DC.

 

Fortunately, though the last 5 or 6 games of the year people tried to get the wave going, it never really took in any of those last few games.

 

Back in grad school, when people started a wave, we started a counter wave and it was awesome because it ALWAYS killed the original wave.  F Seattle and their f'n wave.  Stupidest crowd thing going.  Thought it went out when the calendar flipped to the new century; but if we can still wear Zubas to Bills games, guess that can continue too.

[Crap Throwing Clavin]

7 hours ago, Taro T said:

 

WTF were you in Buffalo?  Figured if you were going to watch Caps Sabres live it would be down in DC.

 

Fortunately, though the last 5 or 6 games of the year people tried to get the wave going, it never really took in any of those last few games.

 

Back in grad school, when people started a wave, we started a counter wave and it was awesome because it ALWAYS killed the original wave.  F Seattle and their f'n wave.  Stupidest crowd thing going.  Thought it went out when the calendar flipped to the new century; but if we can still wear Zubas to Bills games, guess that can continue too.

 

Came up to Niagara Falls for the eclipse and to visit family, decided to catch a Sabres game while we're here, since we never saw one at Key Bank Center.  Worked out that we caught the Caps game.

[MothersMilk]

Dandy Don is no more.

 

 

[MothersMilk]

https://spectrumlocalnews.com/nys/buffalo/news/2024/04/16/sabres-fire-head-coach-don-granato-after-playoff-drought-hits-13-years

 

 

"I would like to thank Don for his time in Buffalo and commitment to the Sabres organization," said general manager Kevyn Adams. "He has been integral in the development of many of our players and has undoubtedly been the right coach to bring us to where we are now, but I felt it was necessary to move in a different direction at this point in time. My expectation is to be a consistent contender and unfortunately that goal has not been met."

[Taro T]

1 hour ago, MothersMilk said:

Dandy Don is no more.

 

 

 

And yet the guy that's responsible for having the power play hitting at under 17% and 28th ranked in the league after being attrocious all but 6-7 weeks last year remains on the payroll.  Matt Ellis' superpower appears to have been bestowed upon him by being bitten by a radioactive cockroach.  A nuclear blast won't get rid of him.

 

Too bad for Granato getting axed.  He seems like a real good guy and has been through a lot.  But this team regressed significantly and without the emergence of UPL they would've been bottom feeders rather than not getting eliminated until after 79 games.  He didn't get the help from Adams he needed in the off-season (Quinn being out for the 1st 3 months should've forced Adams hand to bring in a guy to replace him initially and then add to the F ranks when he returned; Kane was the likely plan, but the timing of HIS return never made that one make sense without at least 1 other move.  They shouldn't have brought back both Girgensons and Okposo.  They needed a vet goalie to pair with either Levi or, as it turns out, UPL that they'd trust to play more than 4 games in the entire 2nd half of the season.  They also needed to give PP coaching duties to somebody other than Ellis.), but at the end of the day; he needed to be able to have them ready to play from opening puck drop and far too often they weren't.  They gave up the most 1st period goals in the league by far and were at least a -30 in the 1st on the season.  You can't ALWAYS be digging out of holes to start every game.

 

They didn't have any monster losing streaks, but they also didn't have any winning streaks of 4 games or more the entire year and only had 3 or 4 - 3 game winning streaks.  They couldn't force games to OT when trailing to pick up some loser points.  So, put it all together and Granato is getting paid to sit at home the next 2 years and the Sabres can get some sweet tee times.

 

Pretty sure the building having a few to several 1,000 empty seats down the stretch and poor renewals forced Adams hand.  Can't see how they were going to market over the summer with everything being the same except for a couple of bottom 6 F's and the backup goalie (likely Levi).

[bdutton]

Thank God we got rid of that Video Coordinator. That guy cost us at least 6 or 7 games and a shot at the playoffs!

[Taro T]

And, while this almost definitely won't come to fruition; Rod Brind'Amour is a FA as soon as this season is over AND he is very good friends with Kevyn Adams.  THAT move would definitely move the needle on Sabres fandom's excitement and filling the building.

 

If not Brind'Amour, would like to see Gerard Gallant brought in with Bob Wood as the PP coordinator.  Both would get far more out of the players than we've seen.  But Gallant wears out his welcome with management quickly so really doubt Pegula & Adams would want to bring him in.  And though Wood is one of the absolute best at running a PP, doubt he'd want to come back to a place he'd been let go from in the past and can't see Matt Ellis getting relieved of his duties regardless of how horrible he is at them.

[MothersMilk]

15 minutes ago, bdutton said:

Thank God we got rid of that Video Coordinator. That guy cost us at least 6 or 7 games and a shot at the playoffs!

He probably showed too many reverse angles.

 

 

[Crap Throwing Clavin]

3 hours ago, MothersMilk said:

Dandy Don is no more.

 

 

 

Not that that was tough to call, but...called it.

[snafu]

Can't fire the owner.

Sad, but it just feels like the next coach = future loser.

 

The players come out flat too many nights.  People say that's a coaching issue, but that's only half true in my book.  I think the roster needs improvement, but right now has enough talent to make the playoffs.  Seems what's holding them back is the fact that they just don't grind (or they do very infrequently) and I don't think the players are wired for that type of game.

 

As for all the prospects in the pipeline, it would be nice to get them all on the same roster in Rochester so they could grow up together.  I realize there are restrictions on who can play where, but what good is it to have a big prospect pool if they can't also build chemistry together.

 

[Alaska Darin]

3 hours ago, snafu said:

Can't fire the owner.

Sad, but it just feels like the next coach = future loser.

 

The players come out flat too many nights.  People say that's a coaching issue, but that's only half true in my book.  I think the roster needs improvement, but right now has enough talent to make the playoffs.  Seems what's holding them back is the fact that they just don't grind (or they do very infrequently) and I don't think the players are wired for that type of game.

 

As for all the prospects in the pipeline, it would be nice to get them all on the same roster in Rochester so they could grow up together.  I realize there are restrictions on who can play where, but what good is it to have a big prospect pool if they can't also build chemistry together.

 

Donnie Meatballs had guys playing a style that don't fit what they do well.  The Sabres should have been a mirror of what Lindy was doing outta the strike with Briere, Drury, and company.  Instead he tried to do some weird "defense-oriented" thing that went against every instinct the players we've drafted have ever played under.  Way too much thinking and not enough just "get the puck and go make something happen."

 

This roster isn't that far away.  The biggest thing it really lacks is confidence and that is 100% on the preparation.

[Crap Throwing Clavin]

16 minutes ago, Alaska Darin said:

Donnie Meatballs had guys playing a style that don't fit what they do well.  The Sabres should have been a mirror of what Lindy was doing outta the strike with Briere, Drury, and company.  Instead he tried to do some weird "defense-oriented" thing that went against every instinct the players we've drafted have ever played under. 

 

THAT season I just watched was "defense oriented?"  Because that was a pretty shitty defensive scheme.  Bad enough that even I noticed.

 

16 minutes ago, Alaska Darin said:

Way too much thinking and not enough just "get the puck and go make something happen."

 

I can't even count how many times I screamed "Put the goddamn puck on the net!" this season when guys were just skating around with it trying to get a clean pass to someone else.  It's not that hard: put the puck on the net, with one or two guys crashing the net to get the rebound.  Vanek's best season (league leading +/- 47, sixth in goals with 43) was him camping in front of the net catching rebounds.

 

Edited April 16 by Crap Throwing Clavin

[Alaska Darin]

2 minutes ago, Crap Throwing Clavin said:

 

THAT season I just watched was "defense oriented?"  Because that was a pretty shitty defensive scheme.  Bad enough that even I noticed.

 

 

I can't even count how many times I screamed "Put the goddamn puck on the net!" this season when guys were just skating around with it trying to get a clean pass to someone else.  It's not that hard: put the puck on the net, with one or two guys crashing the net to get the rebound.  Vanek's best season (league leading +/- 47, sixth in goals with 43) was him camping in front of the net catching rebounds.

 

Like Sam Reinhardt did in Florida this year? 

[Crap Throwing Clavin]

Just now, Alaska Darin said:

Like Sam Reinhardt did in Florida this year? 

 

Yeah.  That just kills me. 

[Ninety-4]

Haven't looked at Sabres closely in a few years.  I know they're young, but a step back in record this year vs last year.  Wacky losing record at home and one of the better road records?  Can the coach survive another year?  

[Taro T]

3 hours ago, Alaska Darin said:

Donnie Meatballs had guys playing a style that don't fit what they do well.  The Sabres should have been a mirror of what Lindy was doing outta the strike with Briere, Drury, and company.  Instead he tried to do some weird "defense-oriented" thing that went against every instinct the players we've drafted have ever played under.  Way too much thinking and not enough just "get the puck and go make something happen."

 

This roster isn't that far away.  The biggest thing it really lacks is confidence and that is 100% on the preparation.

 

2 hours ago, Crap Throwing Clavin said:

 

THAT season I just watched was "defense oriented?"  Because that was a pretty shitty defensive scheme.  Bad enough that even I noticed.

 

 

I can't even count how many times I screamed "Put the goddamn puck on the net!" this season when guys were just skating around with it trying to get a clean pass to someone else.  It's not that hard: put the puck on the net, with one or two guys crashing the net to get the rebound.  Vanek's best season (league leading +/- 47, sixth in goals with 43) was him camping in front of the net catching rebounds.

 

 

They started the year with a "focus on defense" but abandoned that sometime in late November / early December.  But even that "focus on D" wasn't really much of a focus on D.  They didn't install much (if any) of a structure to the D; they just didn't have 2 forwards race to the opposing blue line as soon as they MIGHT have controlled the puck.

 

The biggest improvement to their results came after Levi got called back up from Ra-cha-cha and UPL finally got through whatever mental block was keeping him from going post to post when necessary.  THAT was when Luukkonen started to really improve his GAA and SV% and allow the team to do reasonably well when he was between the pipes.  UPL was awful in the preseason - he exhibited a lot of his old issues but was better when he finally got a chance a few weeks in then a couple of weeks after that he started being able to go quickly across 1/2 the crease; which was something he hadn't done since before the double hip surgery coming off his OHL leading season back in Juniors.

 

Am concerned about his mental toughness; when he isn't the absolute unquestioned #1 he has tended to have poor games and this coming season he most likely will have Levi as his full-time battery mate.  He's still young in goalie years and will have a full off-season to work on the mental aspects and hopefully he gets them figured out.  If he does, the Sabres could go from having only a couple of 1/2 seasons of quality NHL goaltending (Ullmark when healthy his last year in Buffalo; UPL this year after the calendar flipped) with a few shorter stretches scattered in there since trading Miller away to having a true top 10 at worst, possibly top 5, battery within the next 2 seasons.

 

As for them not shooting enough/ driving to the net enough - ab-so-friggin-lute-ly.  They really reminded me of the Avs at the end of Patrick Roy's tenure as coach there.  They were all-in on puck possession; so much so that they spent most of their time in the offensive zone passing the puck around the perimeter looking for a clean uncontested chance to get the puck to slot which meant they didn't get many high danger scoring chances.  Soooo frustrated watching them drop the puck back into their own zone from the neutral zone and even more so passing the puck out of the slot looking for something that might be uncontested.  Just absolutely idiotic.  Won't even talk about their Power(less) Play units.

[Taro T]

17 minutes ago, Ninety-4 said:

Haven't looked at Sabres closely in a few years.  I know they're young, but a step back in record this year vs last year.  Wacky losing record at home and one of the better road records?  Can the coach survive another year?  

 

You're confusing last year with this year.  Last year they won ~75% of their games on the road but were sub-0.500 at home.  This year they were 21-19-1 at home and were exactly 0.500 on the road.

 

And as to your 2nd question, no, no he can't.  He was relieved of his duties this AM.  But somehow Matt Ellis, with his super hero cockroach powers, remains employed.

[Pete]

I seeing the Sabres and every other sports team the pegulas own is up for sale. All except the bills. I’m wondering if it’s because of Kim’s health.