Part 1

The 2014-15 Sabres won 23 games, 10 of them came November 15 and December 27.

Youth Flashes

After beating the Leafs, the Sabres won 4 of their next 5, and then after losing both games of a Florida road trip, they won 4 in a row.

The November stretch was their first with three straight regulation wins since March 2012 and gave the team a boost of confidence that they had not felt to start the season. The goaltending played a big part in the stretch. The Sabres only allowed 1 goal in 4 of those wins as the goaltending was seen as “rock solid“, led by Jhonas Enroth. The 26 year old held a .935 save percentage as the calendar flipped into December. For the other differences, here’s another Buffalo News snippet that encapsulates the stretch:

Following that Florida road trip, Enroth had his signature win of the season to start the 4-0 homestand. With the reigning Stanley Cup Champion LA Kings in town, the Sabres were dominated the whole game to the tune of a 57-18 difference in shot attempts at 5-on-5. The final score? 1-0…Sabres, thanks to a Tyler Ennis powerplay goal. Enroth’s 34 saves gave the Sabres their first shutout win since April 13, 2013, which was also a 1-0 win with Enroth in net. It would be the last time the Sabres allowed less than 2 goals in a game until March 17 and the last shutout until almost a full calendar year later: December 17, 2015 against Anaheim.

In their next game against the Flames, Enroth made another 42 saves in a 4-3 win. For even a minute, even Tim Murray “didn’t see a huge need to shake up this roster.” Were they even starting to believe going forward despite only registering about 36% of shot attempts per game?

Never tell the mid-December Buffalo Sabres the corsi, because in their next game, they outshot the Florida Panthers and then went on to win in overtime thanks to a game-winner from Nikita Zadorov.

The 19 year old made the team out of camp and stayed with the big club the entire season. He was overcoming being benched in Traverse City and becoming a mainstay in the lineup. For 406:40 of 5-on-5 play, he was paired with fellow 2013 first round pick, Rasmus Ristolainen, who scored the first goal of the night in the fourth straight win of the homestand, a 5-4 shootout win over the Senators, which gave them 6 straight home wins for the first time since 2006-07. Yes you read that right. Things went well in December for the pair as they did for the team. Their record in one goal games improved to 11-4-3.

When the team went back on the road on December 16, the streak came to an end with a 5-1 loss in Winnipeg, which was the same score back home on the 20th against the Avalanche. An overtime loss in Boston was followed up with a 6-3 loss to the Red Wings for 4 in a row.

But back home after Christmas off, the team got their final win of 2014 in a 4-3 shootout win over the Islanders in which they came back from being down 3-0 in the third. While the Sabres were still last in the Atlantic and still had the fourth worst record in the NHL, tied with the Devils with 31 points, a 14-19-3 record through 36 games was a pace that would have jumped them from their 52 point bottoming out to about 70 points. In the locker room, that would’ve been a big franchise step going forward.

Oh…Nevermind

The final two games of 2014 saw the Sabres get outscored 10-3 in Ottawa and then home against Tampa Bay. On the bright side, Matt Moulson didn’t actually have the mumps.

He did, however, have the flu, and as January started, it spread around the team. 11 players missed time between mid-December and the start of January, including Brian Gionta and Torey Mitchell up front in addition to Moulson’s flu, and Tyler Myers, Josh Gorges, and Rasmus Ristolainen on defense. A 2-0 loss to the Panthers started the month before a 4 game road trip that went…poorly, even amidst the assistant coaches bag skating for the vibes. The next night, at MSG, the Rangers beat them 6-1. Three days later, the Devils handled the Sabres so easily in the first period that after they went up 3-0 in the first, their fans chanted “Sabres suck.” On January 8, the Sabres scored multiple goals for the first time since December 29, but the Hurricanes scored 5. The next night in Tampa Bay, they only gave up 2 goals for only the second time since that Enroth shutout over the Kings and the only other time in the month of January, but they only scored once.

Coming back home, the team got to honor Dominik Hasek by retiring his jersey, and it turned out the 3-1 loss to Detroit was not the most uncomfortable moment of the night:

“This was embarrassing. There was no one. There wasn’t a former teammate on the ice, and yes, I wouldn’t have been there, but there’s a lot of players that did like [Hasek], respected him, and are in good graces with him. There was no fanfare for that. There was no family there. I love Rene Robert and I love Danny Gare, but to see two guys just skate out with a little banner and raise it and it was over. It was just weird. It was awkward. It was weird.”

–Matthew Barnaby on Sirius XM following the Dominik Hasek jersey retirement ceremony

Don’t worry, the next game two nights later wasn’t an off-ice embarrassment. They saved it for the game. Minnesota 7, Buffalo 0. The worst Sabres loss in the history of the then First Niagara Center. And finally, the got three goals for the first time since their last win two nights later against the Flyers, but Philadelphia scored 4, meaning the Sabres had now lost 10 games in a row and were getting on an airplane for a 5 game road trip. The 10th loss was the first of the entire streak that was by a single goal.

The good news was the all-star break was coming up after the first of those road games. The bad news? The Sabres blew a 3-0 first period lead on their way to a 6-4 loss. The winning goalie in relief was Tom McCollum. You remember Tom McCollum right? The local boy from Sanborn? He’s still playing in the Alps Hockey League! It was his only career NHL win.

At least Zemgus Girgensons was an all star. Hit the jukebox.

Not to put the streak on The Big Guys Pair, but between a slump that saw Zadorov get scratched and a mentally fatiguing stretch for Ristolainen leading to him also sitting for a game, the effects of a D pair of 19 year olds playing heavy minutes was catching up to the team. Teams saw the weaknesses and attacked it the rest of the way.

Perhaps the Ristolainen-Zadorov pair could have had staying power had Zadorov not been dealt the next offseason. But it’s also possible that Zadorov already wasn’t part of the future by he came back late from his All-Star break trip to the Dominican Republic.

What was the issue? Was it credibility? Perhaps. Even their captain was unable to believe how bad it was going as the team returned from the break.

But the fact of the matter was simple: They were a bad hockey team with the numbers to back it up. Take it away again, Buffalo News:

Matt Moulson had not and would not score the entire month. His linemates Tyler Ennis and Zemgus Girgensons were also struggling to generate chances. That continued out of the break, where in their trip to Alberta and BC, the only forward to score was Chris Stewart. Three powerplay goals, even! Didn’t matter though. After Stewart scored first in Calgary, the Flames scored 4 straight. An also bad Oilers team beat them 3-2, and then the next night, the Canucks beat their expansion siblings 5-2 to end a “disgusting” (per Stewart) winless month of January. That put them at 14 losses in a row, three a way from the ’93 Sharks and ’75 Capitals and their record 17 game losing streaks.

BUT NOBODY BEATS THE BUFFALO SABRES FIFTEEN GAMES IN A ROW*! Even a Montreal team that won 15 of their last 20. And hey look! Moulson scored!

Anyways, gee, that month really put a damper on the “thrill” Tim Murray had watching Sam Reinhart at the World Juniors. Wait why is that an important part of this stretch?

Oh right.

“The T Word” makes its debut in Part 3.

(Photo Credit: Bill Wippert via Buffalo Sabres Facebook)

*for six more years