GBU Learning Lessons - Game 1 Loss 5-1, 10-12-2023

[littletonhockeycoach]

G: Had to leave and missed the 3rd period

B: My positive expectations were (temporarily?) cancelled

U: What I saw of the officiating

 

[littletonhockeycoach]

Rangers played a good road game, which means sucking the life out of things and making it hard to watch at times. Coaching squad needs to figure out a way to beat a neutral zone trap team.

Greenway looked good. I'm glad I stopped watching when it became 3-0. Was able to get some video editing done.

Beating the trap? Tell the coaches to try You Tube fro starters.

Ah hell, I'll just send them copies of coaching videos I have on the topic.... Lol....

 

[Gras]

Dump and chase Sabres better not return

I'd hardly call it chase

 

[Steddy33]

G: not shut out
B: lots of things
U: it was either this or Chiefs-Broncos

Maybe you missed it but there was 6 other NHL games on the docket tonight. NFL is for people who enjoy advertisements as an entertainment source.

 

[Fjordy]

Damn, looks not good

 

[alehman42]

Maybe you missed it but there was 6 other NHL games on the docket tonight. NFL is for people who enjoy advertisements as an entertainment source.

I'm a Mechanical and Biomedical Engineering professor, and two of my colleagues are concussion researchers.

The average life expectancy of someone on the NFL's pension plan is 57 years. I've also done some work with the Oceanside Unified School District and have met Junior Seau's family...they would give all the money back to have Junior back and healthy.

I promise you there are many, many better ways to spend your Sunday afternoons than watching men do massive neurological damage to one another for your entertainment.

(Between ads for pick-up trucks and diabetes meds, to Steddy's point).

[/End Soapbox]

 

[old kummelweck]

Didn't surprise me they lost. This team did not look ready for the regular season in the last 2 preseason games. I felt the Sabres spent way too long taking a 'look' at their depth guys that weren't going to make the roster. I am not worried about them figuring it out, but lets just hope they don't put themselves in too much of a hole.

Even if it's not pretty, they need to win against the Isles. They may want to go back to Levi to get him going, but I would probably start Comrie.

 

[Dubi Doo]

That'll bring the fans back, boys!

 

[Irie]

Didn't surprise me they lost. This team did not look ready for the regular season in the last 2 preseason games. I felt the Sabres spent way too long taking a 'look' at their depth guys that weren't going to make the roster. I am not worried about them figuring it out, but lets just hope they don't put themselves in too much of a hole.

Even if it's not pretty, they need to win against the Isles. They may want to go back to Levi to get him going, but I would probably start Comrie.

I think there are some hungry young players on this team that submit to the philosophy that "off-season training is when you advance your game", and would fit right in with a Gary Roberts off-season training invite.

Then there are some players who look at the off-season as 4 months of fun and relaxation, and would probably fit in well with a tiger woods off-season training invite.

Some of the players looked to be in mid-season-shape, and some of them look like they are still barely in first week of training camp shape.

This team needs less comfort and more commitment , hopefully a lot of talented, hungry prospects will raise the fitness stakes and light a fire under those that are coasting a bit too much.

 

[Sabresbyswords104]

what happend? Just a bad game or what ?

 

[old kummelweck]

I think there are some hungry young players on this team that submit to the philosophy that "off-season training is when you advance your game", and would fit right in with a Gary Roberts off-season training invite.

Then there are some players who look at the off-season as 4 months of fun and relaxation, and would probably fit in well with a tiger woods off-season training invite.

Some of the players looked to be in mid-season-shape, and some of them look like they are still barely in first week of training camp shape.

This team needs less comfort and more commitment , hopefully a lot of talented, hungry prospects will raise the fitness stakes and light a fire under those that are coasting a bit too much.

The players are ready, they are pros. The off season conditioning is to get ready for camp. Camp is where you get ready for the season. Camp is 100% on Donnie and Kevyn right now. I think we sometimes forget those two are learning on the job.

The Rangers came ready with a plan to shut down the Sabres attack. The Sabres were fumbling the pucks, missing passes, turning the puck over, losing battles. All of that is established in practice.

Do I wish guys like Thompson and Tuch looked in top form? Yes, but to do that, they probably need a few games. Games they should have gotten in preseason.

Now, does this mean that the Sabres pre season evaluation was useless? Not necessarily. They have good data on the guys in Roch and it may make things better down the road. But right now, there is potential here for them to get into a hole, points wise, while they get into season form.

It's disappointing but not the end of the world.

 

[Dubi Doo]

what happend? Just a bad game or what ?

Hard to read into game one, but a lot of the same problems from last year spilled over into this game. Too early to be too concerned, though.

It's going to be interesting to see how they respond. Last year- if they got their asses whooped- there was a good chance they were going to go on a losing streak. Hopefully, they've grown in that regard.

I think they need to break this tape down because they're going to get forcefed a lot of 1-3-1 as a way to counter them.

Fun! Just the type of hockey we all love to watch, and that has proven to grow the sport!

 

[debaser66]

G: Feel asleep pretty quickly and it seems my body made the right choice
Its just one game, they will be fine.
This will wake them up for the next game.

 

[Dubi Doo]

It's the first game nothing to worry about. Saw a lot of good skating, just played a team that was really ready to play and frankly wanted the win a lot more

I do want to put coaching under the bad column

The sabres looked like they expected to play against the rangers from last season, the ones that would skate not the ones that were gonna play a hard 1-3-1

The first goal against granato wanted to match the Krebs/z/okposi line against the the rangers panaran/laf/chytil and short shifted tage/skinner/tuch to do so.

Second faceoff of the game it's a defensive zone faceoff, put oloffson out there. The guy gets caved in the defensive zone. Why? Use him more neutral or offensive zone starts

If they want to use cozens/peterka in all situations/defensive match ups oloffson needs to be moved off that line

Eeek! I hope they don't try that. Neither player has shown the ability to play a strong, consistent defensive game yet. Mitts/Krebs lines should do most of the heavy lifting. Even though Mitts, outside of a few flashes, was pretty bad last night.

 

[TheMistyStranger]

Beating the trap? Tell the coaches to try You Tube fro starters.

Ah hell, I'll just send them copies of coaching videos I have on the topic.... Lol....

From what I saw, it didn't look like they had any idea. Either that or the players refused to try. Either way, not good.

 

[TageGod]

This game was more of what the Rangers did than the Sabre's didn't. They were clogged up and neutralized all game with little to no space. Add that to a team that looks rusty and you get game 1.

 

[Irie]

The players are ready, they are pros. The off season conditioning is to get ready for camp. Camp is where you get ready for the season. Camp is 100% on Donnie and Kevyn right now. I think we sometimes forget those two are learning on the job.

The Rangers came ready with a plan to shut down the Sabres attack. The Sabres were fumbling the pucks, missing passes, turning the puck over, losing battles. All of that is established in practice.

Do I wish guys like Thompson and Tuch looked in top form? Yes, but to do that, they probably need a few games. Games they should have gotten in preseason.

Now, does this mean that the Sabres pre season evaluation was useless? Not necessarily. They have good data on the guys in Roch and it may make things better down the road. But right now, there is potential here for them to get into a hole, points wise, while they get into season form.

It's disappointing but not the end of the world.

Realistically, all the players approach the off-season differently. The best players tend to take a couple weeks off then get to work and work hard from June to September. Other players relax, vacation, play a lot of golf, and hit the gym two weeks before camp opens.

The players that train all off season hit camp in mid season shape. The other type often aren't really in peak shape until November and they often start slow.

Right now several players on this team do not look to be in mid season shape. That is mostly on the players, because like you said, they are professionals and some things are just expected of them. Maybe it is on Granato a little bit if he lets them get away with being less prepared - some coaches historically come down hard on guys that aren't physically ready when camp opens, and maybe his rules are less strict. I don't. See how any of the preparation side of things falls on the GM though, other than if you think he assembled the wrong group of players or coaching staff.

 

[Sabresfansince1980]

Beating the trap? Tell the coaches to try You Tube fro starters.

Ah hell, I'll just send them copies of coaching videos I have on the topic.... Lol....

I was going to post about how they "should" be willing to dump, chase, and forecheck but they just aren't a great roster for that type of game right now. So besides that, what are the creative ways to beat the trap that Buffalo is currently suited for?

 

[truthbluth]

I can’t even describe my level of disappointment. I had a bad feeling watching these guys in preseason. Last night reminded me of opening night, 2016. So much promise, and then they came out and laid a big fat egg. This team is just f***ing cursed.

 

[BuffaloGooner]

I had no idea Lavi decided to turn the Rangers into the f***ing Islanders and come out immediately in a 1-3-1.

Last year they figured out how to beat teams that play that way, but not tonight. Officiating was horrendous early. The PP went away from everything they did preseason, and our best players were our worst players.

Oh well, 81 more. We’ll be fine.

 

[TageGod]

Well we all know Sabre's always lose the first game of the season.

 

[Jim Bob]

G: Nobody suffered a season ending injury

B: Still being stifled by the 1-3-1

U: That hooking call on Benson

 

[DickSmehlik]

Been saying it all off-season, staying the course which Adams did this off-season, was likely going to result in us being about the same team as last year, which was a 10th place team.

I think with not pursuing a higher performing defenseman and another quality goaltender, he is going to squander a lot of goodwill built up last year when they miss the post-season again.

 

[Jim Bob]

 

[Sabre the Win]

Well we all know Sabre's always lose the first game of the season.

Last year they beat Ottawa, the year before that they beat Montreal. In 2020 they lost in the COVID season but before that in 2019 they beat Pittsburgh, 2018 they beat Columbus.

That's just factually not correct.