BUFFALO – In earning just their 15th win in 41 attempts, a 4-3 shootout triumph over the heavyweight Washington Capitals, the Sabres should feel a glimmer of hope exactly halfway through what has been, shall we say, a challenging season.
The Sabres still sit in last place in the Eastern Conference following Monday’s victory. They must make up a six-point deficit and climb seven teams to reach the second wild card spot.
Still, if they give more efforts like they did Monday in ending their three-game winless skid, maybe they can move into the thick of the postseason chase.
After Aliaksei Protas tied the game 15:47 into the third period and Pierre-Luc Dubois put Washington up in the first round of the shootout, winger Alex Tuch tied it in the third and winger JJ Peterka put the Sabres ahead in the fourth.
Goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen secured the win before 15,548 fans in KeyBank Center by stopping Jakob Chychrun.
Despite recently losing 13 straight games, the Sabres, who lost rookie Jiri Kulich to a lower-body injury, still have a chance.
“It should drive all of us, to know you’re that close,” Sabres coach Lindy Ruff said of the standings. “When you go through what we went through, we should come out of this a better team. Everybody should come out as a better player and understand how hard it is to win games and sometimes how easy it is to lose them.
“And I think that we’ve got some players that are growing, that understand now that no easy game, and there’s no easy play. We’re fortunate that the way everything has unfolded, we’re within striking distance with (41) games left.”
Forward Tage Thompson, who scored a power-play goal in the second period, said a lot can transpire over a marathon season.
“So I think you can never count yourself out, and you just got to have a short-term mindset,” he said. “I think you got to look at it one game at a time. Anything can happen. I think, obviously, in our division, there’s a lot of teams that are right there in the mix, handful of points away from each other. I think it’s who can just stay mentally strongest until the end of the season.
“I think there’s teams that are going to go on some cold streaks and some teams that are going to go on some hot streaks, and it’s going to separate. We got to find ourselves in a hot streak.”
The Sabres have consistently shown all season that any lead they’re fortunate enough to grab is fragile. But perhaps they’re learning from the harsh lessons of those games.
They downed Washington after the conference’s best team team erased three one-goal deficits, including their 3-2 advantage late in the third period.
Each time the Capitals tied the game, the Sabres responded.
“I think we’ve been in situations like that all season, so we’ve had a lot of experience to draw off,” Thompson said. “… We did a good job responding all game just to all the little pushes they had.
“They’re a good team, so they had shifts where they were in our zone and got good looks, and I don’t think we let it affect us. (We) went right back to playing our game.”
The Sabres managed to plow forward after staying in Vegas following Saturday’s 3-1 loss to the Golden Knights and flying across the country Sunday. Players can look lethargic in the first game following a trip to the west coast.
“I thought we played a really strong full 60 minutes, honestly, especially coming back from out west, it can be tough to get your legs,” said Tuch, who scored a breakaway goal in the second period after stealing the puck from Chychrun. “Tough travel day yesterday and getting home … in the afternoon and having a quick turnaround there.”
Ruff said Kulich, who left in the second period, will be reevaluated today.
“Hopefully it won’t be too long,” Ruff said.
Peterka opened the scoring for the Sabres. Tom Wilson scored Washington’s first two goals. Luukkonen made 25 saves. Capitals goalie Charlie Lindgren stopped 24 shots.
Update: Peterka’s goal has been credited to Tuch, giving him two on the night. Peterka now has an assist on the goal.
Sabres played well throughout. It was a very entertaining game. More impressive, considering a long travel day on Sunday and long minutes logged by Sabres top players.
Still, Sabres almost gave it away, late again. Power failing to make a play on tying goal making it 3-3. Earlier, Caps scored when Cozens failed to clear.
I’ve never seen a team struggle like this one to clear the damn puck.
Monumental win. Another loss giving up a lead late in the 3rd, would have broken this team.
It’s embarassing when Benson & Krebs antagonize the other team, like they did again last night.
McLeod looked good on the 2nd line with Tuch & Peterka.
Must win Thursday @ Ottawa.