Exploring the Sabres path to the top four in the East Division

The Buffalo Sabres have a daunting task ahead of them this season. In what is a very talented East Division, reaching the top-four (i.e. a playoff spot) seems like something of a longshot. Fortunately, in a shortened season the goal of breaking the league’s longest postseason drought probably isn’t as insurmountable as it appears on paper.

That statement might sound overly optimistic. After all, four of the top-five teams in the Eastern Conference last season are now in the Sabres’ division. According to Sean Tierney’s standing prediction, the blue-and-gold are projected to finish second-last, ahead of only the New Jersey Devils.

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This obviously isn’t ideal, and while I mostly agree with Sean’s overall rankings, the point-projection disparity seems a bit extreme. Buffalo has improved its lineup, and there are conceivable circumstances that could put them in the mix for the number four spot.

To put it plainly, the Sabres need a couple of teams ahead of them to fall short of expectations (while also surpassing their own). The middle of the division is more evenly matched than many realize, and the room for error is slim. Let’s take a look at which teams could regress, allowing Buffalo to squeak into the top-four.

Regression Candidates

For the sake of this exercise, we’ll make a couple of assumptions. The first is that the Sabres will finish ahead of the New Jersey Devils. After ending the 2019-20 campaign with an identical amount of points as Buffalo, the Devils did very little to improve their roster.

While the addition of Ryan Murray will help solidify things on the blue line, New Jersey simply cannot score. Corey Crawford could help them in the net but expect this team to try and grind out low-scoring defensive struggles to compete in 2021. That’s a big ask for a team that finished 25th in xGF rate and 27th in xGA last season.

On the flip side, teams like the Boston Bruins and Washington Capitals seem to be locks for the top-four in the division. Boston’s situation is a little dicey. They will be without stars David Pastrnak and Brad Marchand likely until February.

Unfortunately for Buffalo, they won’t directly benefit from this, considering that their first contest against the Bruins is slated for February 6. Otherwise, last season’s President’s Trophy winner appears to be the most complete team in the division despite losing defenseman Torey Krug to free-agency.

Washington is also coming off a really impressive 2020-21 campaign. While the top-half of their forward group is getting older, the organization added some pieces on the blue line, while also retaining trade-deadline acquisition Brendan Dillon. They might see a small regression in 2021, but they were on pace for just under 107 points in 2019-20 (over an 82 game season). It would take quite the fall for them to tumble out of the playoff picture.

The rest of the teams in the division are wild cards (to varying extents), the Sabres included. The following opponents are ordered from most likely to regress, to least.

1. New York Rangers

We’ll keep these sections relatively brief. Last season, the Rangers were on pace to finish with 92 points over 82-games. In a typical year, that would have likely kept them out of the playoff race. Alexis Lafreniere is a big addition to what was already a very young group of forwards.

Defensively, the Rangers are a bit of a mixed bag. Adam Fox and Jacob Trouba are both excellent assets, but for a team that really lucked out by allowing a lot fewer goals-against than expected, adding Jack Johnson as the only move on the blue line is risky.

New York will probably be forced to rely on their young goalie tandem of Igor Shestyorkin and Alex Georgiev. The two of them performed well in 2019-20, posting save-percentages of .932 and .910, respectively.

The Rangers’ fate rests with their youth, and unless they get stellar play between the pipes, they are still a rather incomplete group, especially on defense.

2. New York Islanders

Fans on Long Island should thank their lucky stars for Barry Trotz because, on paper, the Islanders look nothing like a playoff contender. Last season, New York made it all the way to the Eastern Conference Final, far surpassing expectations. During the regular season, they were pacing out only slightly better than the Rangers and would have been a fringe team in a typical year.

As a cap-strapped team from the beginning of the offseason, the Islanders did very little to improve their lineup from 2019-20. They made no significant signings at forward and lost one of their best defensemen in Devon Toews.

Like the Rangers, the Islanders will need strong play in the net. Last season, Semyon Varlamov finished with the eighth-best GSAx rate among starting netminders league-wide. Despite being the ninth-best xGA/60 team with a rate of 2.22, they did nothing to improve a very mediocre offense. Losing Toews as a transition asset will hurt them in both regards.

3. Pittsburgh Penguins

It feels a little audacious putting the Penguins here, especially considering that Sean had them ranked second in his projection. Despite finishing third in the Metropolitan Division last season, their underlying numbers weren’t all that impressive.

Despite being one of the best defensive teams in the NHL, their expected offensive output was uncharacteristically low. Their GM did them very few favors in that regard, overpaying via trade for a very mediocre middle-six asset in Kasperi Kapanen. Like the Sabres, the Penguins have a very top-heavy forward lineup, with a lot of uninspiring pieces comprising the bottom-six.

Though they were able to rid themselves of Jack Johnson on defense, they added another metrically flawed asset in Cody Ceci. The Penguins are another situation where goaltending performance will be huge. Tristan Jarry played very well in 2019-20 with a save percentage of .921, but he is still a relative unknown.

Inevitably, Casey DeSmith will be an improvement over Matt Murray (who posted a league-low GSAx of -23.07 last season), but he isn’t talented enough to assume starting duties should Jarry falter. Again, Pittsburgh’s defensive metrics are strong but moderate uncertainty in the net is still an important point.

4. Philadelphia Flyers

Of the “wild card” teams projected in the middle of the East Division, the Flyers seem like the least likely to see a regression. In terms of both xGA and xGF, they were almost identical to the Capitals last season. The only thing working against them was the regression they saw after a hot start to the season.

After a ridiculously strong October, the Flyers actually carried a very mediocre xG rate for the remainder of the season. The good news for Philadelphia is the fact that goaltender Carter Hart looks like the real deal. At just 22 years old, he carried the third-best GSAx rate in the NHL last season at 14.19.

One interesting thing to note here is how the Flyers’ hot start coincided with poor play from Hart, and how his excellent play in the middle of the season helped lift a skater group that produced very middling results. We’ll see if that remains the case in 2021.

What the Sabres Need

So far, we’ve gone over which teams the Sabres could conceivably leap-frog en route to a place in the divisional top-four. Now, let’s examine the three biggest factors that will contribute to Buffalo doing their part in all of this, and showing a marked improvement from what we saw in Ralph Krueger’s inaugural campaign.

1. A Big Year From Ullmark

I’ll be blunt. No Sabres player carries more weight in 2021 than Linus Ullmark. As the undisputed starter between the pipes, he must finally prove that he is a career NHL netminder. Of the 32 goalies who played at least 1,600 even-strength minutes last season, the 27-year-old ranked ninth with a mark of -0.17.

The five-on-five play wasn’t a problem for Ullmark in 2019-20. His issues came on the penalty-kill, which were partially his fault, but also the result of a very poor PK system in front of him. Still, only three netminders held a lower GSAx rate while shorthanded and that’s an indictment of Ullmark’s individual play.

By extension, the Sabres also need Carter Hutton to play the part of a semi-competent backup. Last year, while battling vision problems, he posted the worst metrics of his career. In a shortened season, his workload will be smaller, assuming Ullmark stays healthy. Hopefully, he can squeeze out one more season of competent play before his contract expires.

2. Top-Six Success

After choosing not to address a flawed defensive corps, and a shaky goaltending tandem, the Sabres need their high-profile additions on offense to make a massive impact. The organization spent two years without a legitimate second-line center before Kevyn Adams found a viable, short-term solution in Eric Staal.

Though the 36-year-old posted positive metrics (particularly on offense) in 2019-20, he is at the end of his career. Hopefully, his presence will not only resolve the Sabres’ perpetual issue of being a one-line team but also help mentor young players like Dylan Cozens.

On the top line, the Sabres prized free-agent acquisition, Taylor Hall will have to regain the career form he displayed before 2019-20. It is essentially a foregone conclusion that he’ll skate with jack Eichel on the top forward line. Obviously, that bumps talent on the wing down the lineup, which means that for the first time in nearly a decade, there will be a competent top-six in Western New York.

Despite some serious flaws down the lineup, in a shortened season, Krueger will hopefully be able to lean on his top two scoring lines to an extent where their success far outweighs a sub-optimal bottom-six. Without strong deployment tactics and offensive dominance from the team’s scoring lines, the Sabres will fall flat.

3. Unleashing Dahlin

This last part isn’t as imperative as the first two, but it sure would help. Last season, Krueger put the training wheels back on Rasmus Dahlin after Phil Housley let him run wild as a rookie. As a result, the first-year coach took away the 19-year-old’s best attributes and ended up hurting his overall impacts.

Hopefully, the coaching staff realizes that Dahlin’s best work comes when he is allowed to be creating with the puck, and join the offensive rush. Buffalo drafted him first-overall to become a franchise defenseman. This season is the perfect time to loosen the restraints and see what he can become. This is a contract year for him, and the front office should be eager to see what he’s capable of leading up to contract talks this summer.

Conclusion

There’s obviously a lot to unpack here. At the end of the day, the Sabres need to find a way to be better than three of the four “wild card” teams I listed above. It’s a big ask, but not an unreasonable one.

This is an unorthodox season we have ahead of us. A lot of factors play into how each team will fare, not only in a truncated season but also facing the same seven opponents all year long. The NHL is a league of parity under normal circumstances. That could become even more the case in 2021.

In short, the Sabres’ odds of making the playoffs are tough to gauge, but the teams ahead of them are far from perfect. Under the right circumstances, they could end up surprising a lot of people.