Game 3: Forty good minutes when you need 60
The Buffalo Sabres had a 1-0 lead after two periods but wound up eating a 3-1 loss in the home opener against the Los Angeles Kings.

BUFFALO — Of the all-time predictable hockey clichés, saying “we’ve got to play a full 60-minute game” is among the most obvious and predictable that players and coaches alike fall back on. Seeing a game play out in real time in which a team does not play a solid 60 minutes will happen with some kind of regularity.
In Buffalo, the Sabres of many years past have routinely not played a full 60 minutes and Thursday’s home opener was another one to add to the list. But this one had a different flavor.
A 1-0 Sabres lead after two periods wound up turning into a 3-1 loss after three periods when Los Angeles Kings captain Anze Kopitar netted a natural hat trick (two of them past Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen and one into an empty net) to get them off to a good start while they spend the next few weeks away from home with their arena being renovated.
A misplay by Rasmus Dahlin 13 seconds (yes, Buffalo fans, for real) into the third period allowed Kopitar to score his first and tie the game. A questionable penalty call against Jason Zucker late in the period put the Sabres and their very strong penalty kill back into action, but a Mattias Samuelsson penalty 1:32 later put them down two men. Seconds later, Kopitar’s slap shot beat Luukkonen to put the Kings ahead with 1:38 to go in the game and followed it up 56 seconds later with his hat trick tally.
After 40 minutes this was meant to be an upbeat write-up on all the good things the Sabres had accomplished. Those extra 20 minutes turned out to be rather important.
“I think we did a little bit better job, I think, leading up until we gave up a soft goal in the third and we started playing a little bit on our heels and didn’t get back to our game nearly enough and shift after shift like we were in the first couple periods,” Sabres forward Alex Tuch said. “Disappointing is an understatement. It’s a good first 40, but we have to be able to play 60 to win in this league.”
Thoughts and observations on the way…
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