BUFFALO – Sooner or later, this was bound to happen. Over a 41-game stretch before the Sabres stumbled this week, they won a stunning 80 percent of their contests.
That they hadn’t endured a three-game losing streak since early December illustrates the dominance they’ve showcased for nearly four months.
Even heavyweights fall into slumps, and right now, the Sabres, who on Friday lost 5-2 to the Detroit Red Wings, are struggling a bit.
“I’ve been saying it all year, we’re going to hit adversity at some point, and we’ve had a long, sustained stretch of really excellent play, and now we’re hitting a little bit of adversity,” Sabres goalie Alex Lyon said.
The Sabres have still been productive this week, registering two points for overtime losses to the Anaheim Ducks and Boston Bruins. Incredibly, Friday’s loss before a capacity crowd of 19,070 fans in KeyBank Center ended a 28-game stretch in which the Sabres held a lead.
But over the last three games, they’ve been scored on first and played much or all of the night from behind.
On Friday against the team that had won just two of its last seven games, the Sabres trailed 3-0 by the 16:06 mark. Their lack of discipline put them in an early hole, as Alex DeBrincat and Lucas Raymond each scored power-play goals to put the Red Wings up 2-0 9:11 into the game.
“I thought that first three, four minutes, we started good,” Sabres coach Lindy Ruff said. “(Alex) Tuch in alone, skated well, got three opportunities. But we can’t start the game with taking two penalties like we did. That just fueled their energy, got their special teams going.”
Marco Kasper scored later in the period.
Those early penalties helped doom the Sabres. They gave the Red Wings five power plays on the night, three of which were high-sticking calls.
“You’re going to end up paying a price, and they made us pay a price for the penalties we took,” Ruff said.
The Sabres, who host the Seattle Kraken this afternoon, got going in the second period, getting a goal from center Tage Thompson at 5:35 and outshooting Detroit 12-3.
“The way we responded in the second was extremely positive,” said Lyon, who has allowed 10 goals in two games this week. “I could’ve stopped a few more in the first, maybe it’s a different game. There’s a million different sliding-scale factors that contributed to that first period.”
The Sabres generated offense, pumping 30 shots on goalie John Gibson. They just couldn’t bury their chances.
“We were skating really good right off the bat. We were driving through the middle of the ice, we were taking guys one-on-one,” Ruff said. “I don’t think our skating was an issue tonight, and we generated. We just didn’t finish. There’s some good opportunities there that we didn’t take advantage of.”
Former Sabres defenseman Jacob Bernard-Docker, who wasn’t given a qualifying offer by Buffalo following last season, made it 4-1 in the third period.
After Sabres captain Rasmus Dahlin made it a two-goal game again, Patrick Kane scored an empty-net goal.
“We’re hitting that bump in the road right now, and we’re going to see what we’re made of here, and we need to put our foot down on the gas and just kind of reset, I think, and reassert ourselves,” said Lyon, who made 15 saves.
Luckily for the Sabres, they have another game today.
“It’s going to show what type of team we are,” Dahlin said. “We have to show ourselves that we got to dig ourselves out of this. This is unacceptable.”
