BUFFALO – In his five-year, 218-game NHL career, Sabres defenseman Jacob Bryson has never felt this good.
“I think confidence-wise, I feel my best,” Bryson said following Thursday’s practice in KeyBank Center. “I’ve been getting good feedback, and every time I watch my shifts I’ve thought I’ve had pretty good games.”
Of course, the 5-foot-9, 177-pound Bryson, like any player, has occasionally struggled. In last Saturday’s 4-2 road win over the San Jose Sharks, he skated a season-low 11 minutes, 27 seconds. He played just three shifts in third period.
But a strong month – Friday afternoon’s 4-3 overtime loss to the Vancouver Canucks was Bryson’s 12th consecutive appearance – outweighs one weak outing.
“Based on his body of play, he’s played really well – defended really well, broke the puck out really well, which has been important for us,” Sabres coach Lindy Ruff said. “… (San Jose was) really his first game where some of the decisions he made, some of the coverage wasn’t where he’s been in the previous games.”
Ruff’s belief in Bryson, who sat out the first 11 games this season as a healthy scratch, has infused him with confidence.
“That probably was, I would say, my worst game of the year,” he said of his performance in San Jose. “I didn’t really play in the third period. I took full responsibility and I understood why I didn’t play. I didn’t play well those first two periods. …
“It’s nice to have coaches that trust you and put you back in the lineup the next day and have a good game.”
The style Ruff likes to play – “Direct, north, simple, quick to close,” Bryson said – has benefited the Providence College product, whose ability to break the puck out is arguably his best asset.
“I feel like I’m playing some of my best hockey,” he said.
Bryson has enjoyed perhaps the best stretch of his career after sitting out the first month of the season.
Ruff said Bryson’s “willingness to pay the price of staying ready” is “a rare ability for some guys.”
“Some guys face lack of hope,” Ruff said of sitting out. “I think he used it as an opportunity to just maintain or get better as a player, so that when his opportunity came, he knew he was going to succeed. He was going to make it hard for us to take him out of the lineup.”
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The Sabres recalled forward prospect Tyson Kozak from the Rochester Americans following Friday’s game because winger Sam Lafferty suffered a lower-body injury and will likely be sidelined for tonight’s road game against the New York Islanders.
Kozak, 21, has compiled a team-high five goals and six points in 14 games this season. The Sabres drafted him in the seventh round in 2021, 193rd overall.
The 5-foot-11, 185-pound Kozak has compiled 15 goals and 28 points in 110 games with Rochester over three seasons.
Ruff said following the game that defenseman Mattias Samuelsson, who’s week to week with a lower-body injury, skated for the first time Friday. Samuelsson was injured Nov. 11.
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Canucks defenseman Tyler Myers, 34, played his first four seasons under Ruff in Buffalo and is the last active NHL player from the Sabres’ last playoff team in 2010-11.
Ruff remembers the 6-foot-8, 229-pound Myers as a skinny teenager when he won the Calder Trophy as the NHL’s top rookie in 2009-10. Today, he’s a veteran of 1,017 games.
“It puts a smile on my face, actually,” he said of his memories of Myers. “A lot of good memories of Tyler his first couple years. You look at a guy that was like 6-7 that weighed about 200 pounds, and thinking, ‘Better get a little weight on, eat a little bit more.’
“Some of us don’t have a problem with that eat-a-little-bit-more thing. Tyler, I think, had to learn that throughout his career. He one time said to me, ‘I got to get my man strength.’ He didn’t have his man strength yet.”
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The Sabres scratched winger Nicolas Aube-Kubel and defenseman Dennis Gilbert (both healthy) on Friday. Captain Rasmus Dahlin, who left Thursday’s practice early, played.