Game 77: All gas, no brakes, not even an E-brake

When as much happened in a Buffalo Sabres 7-6 shootout win against the Detroit Red Wings it's enough to fill a book, it's the rarest of rare times.

DETROIT — Whew.

It’s not often when a regular season game between two teams that most likely are not making the playoffs has as much excitement, drama, nonsense, and outright manic play as Thursday night’s affair between the Sabres and Red Wings did.

After all, Detroit is out of the hunt for the playoffs and Buffalo is barely in the picture, yet still not officially out of contention. It could’ve been a boring throw-away game with two teams trying to not get hurt. Instead, it was a goal bonanza with blown leads, silly goals, Dylan Cozens breaking the 30-goal barrier, a near line brawl, and ultimately a boring overtime turned cardiac and a shootout that saw rookie Devon Levi shut the door to give Buffalo a 7-6 win.

There is a whole pile of observations to make here and thoughts from some players and the coach from the Buffalo side of things to poke through here so let’s buckle down and get to it because, damn, there’s a lot.

First thing’s first, Tage Thompson didn’t skate in the morning and was a game-time decision and given how he’s clearly been battling through an injury, it was a toss-up whether or not he would play. Ultimately, he did, and Don Granato set out a whole new set of lines to go with it.