Buffalo Sabres: Early hope has turned into familiar despair

After a 10 game winning streak, everyone thought the Buffalo Sabres were ready to take the next step. That early hope has morphed into a familiar feeling of despair.

Back in November, the Buffalo Sabres were the toast of the NHL. They won 10 straight games from November 8 to November 27. After their 10th straight win, the Sabres owned the best point percentage in the NHL at .720. For the first time in a while, fans in Buffalo had hope and they could see the light at the end of the tunnel.

This light has gone away since then. The Sabres have gone 13-22-7 since their winning streak, good for a point percentage of .393. How bad is that? Only the Ottawa Senators have a lower point percentage since then.

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In hindsight, the winning streak was nothing short of a mirage. The Sabres needed overtime to win seven of those games. Of those seven, three of them went to a shootout. Nine of those 10 wins were determined by one goal.

Let’s take away that 10 game winning streak. Without it, the Sabres would have 49 points in 57 games. 49 points divided by 114 (remember each game has two points available) is roughly 0.43, so that’s their point percentage. While this would be an improvement over last season’s .393 point percentage, improvement wasn’t so much a want as it was a need. It’s almost impossible to not improve from those numbers.

The Sabres rank in the bottom 10 in both goals scored and goals allowed. Buffalo made a number of changes last summer, hoping they could change their culture. They traded Ryan O’Reilly for Vladimir Sobotka, Patrik Berglund, Tage Thompson, and a 2019 first-round pick (top 10 protected). The Sabres also traded for Jeff Skinner, who has been a life saver for them by picking up 36 goals. Even those moves weren’t enough.

If this season has taught the Sabres anything, it’s that they have more changes ahead of them. The trade for Brandon Montour was a good one and it could open up some options for Buffalo. They have seven defensemen under contract for next season before factoring in Jake McCabe, who is a restricted free agent.

The next guy to be traded by the Sabres could be Rasmus Ristolainen. They fielded offers for him last summer but decided to move on from O’Reilly instead. In hindsight, the Sabres traded the wrong player. Ristolainen is still young at 24 years old. His value to another team is likely higher than his value to the Sabres, especially with Montour.

Veteran defenseman Zach Bogosian is another option. He’s had a decent season, so perhaps another team would be interested in him. But given Bogosian’s injury history, this isn’t likely to happen. If the Sabres want to create change, it has to start with trading Ristolainen. This would also free up cap space so they can re-sign Skinner, who has helped Jack Eichel post the best numbers of his career.

Trading a defenseman would open up a spot on the Sabres blue line, which could be filled by a free agent signing, a trade, or by interesting young defensemen Casey Nelson, who’s shown enough to warrant a longer look.

To be fair to general manager Jason Botterill, who hasn’t seen much improvement since taking over, this mess isn’t his fault. This is what happens when you have a draft history as bad as Tim Murray’s. It’s going to take a while for the Sabres to dig themselves out and this season has proven they have a long way to go.