Game 6: Fodder
Disturbingly familiar occurrences made some appearances in the Buffalo Sabres brutal 6-4 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets
COLUMBUS — It would be easy (and rather lazy) to say that the Sabres 6-4 loss to the Blue Jackets was something we’ve seen before in the recent past. But the situation with the Sabres is different under Lindy Ruff, at least it’s supposed to be.
The attitude was different headed into training camp as well as into the start of the regular season. But Wednesday’s loss on the road in Pittsburgh and Thursday’s defeat were examples of how echoes from the past remain.
In some cases, they’re deeply familiar and never seem to disappear completely (like Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin), but in other ways, they’re different despite them playing out like a rerun on television back in the day. Thursday’s loss was like a gritty reboot of a game from last season just without a lot of the actual grit.
Alex Tuch said the Sabres lacked urgency from the start of the game and the Blue Jackets came out all guns blazing, pressuring the Sabres all over the ice and forcing them to make fast puck decisions that went awry. But citing a lack of urgency in the sixth game of the season is a bit of a staggering thought.
“I think we just got to support each other more with and without the puck, and just in general,” Tuch said. “We knew they were coming with a lot of energy, and we can't let that get to us and force us to come away from our game. So just a lot more support with each other.”
Rasmus Dahlin felt he was forcing a lot of plays and that forced plays lead to problems. He wasn’t alone in trying to make something happen out of nothing, but he put it on himself to be better to set an example. Falling on your sword is noble.
“You want to win,” Dahlin said. “That’s the start and then sometimes you have to just play your shift and move on to the next one and wait for your opportunity.”
The defense playing as poorly as they did against Columbus was perhaps the new wrinkle to make the familiar seem a little different. Dahlin owned up for his errors, but all of their defensemen had moments they’d like to forget.
“Yeah, it’s surprising,” Sabres coach Lindy Ruff said. “Plays that we didn’t make for a couple of games, then all of a sudden, we’ve made some ill-advised plays. It creates momentum for the other team.”
On top of all of those things, Devon Levi wasn’t able to make up for the mistakes and contributed his own tough night to make it really hard to take anything positive away from the game. At least Jiri Kulich got his first NHL goal.
More from a tough night in the Buckeye State ahead.
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