Post-Game Talk: Sabres 3, Penguins 1 - Deja Vu All Over Again

[Pancakes]

Nah, he was better than last year's Phil 5 on 5. But, that's not exactly setting the limbo bar high.

Maybe very slightly. He turned the puck over constantly when he did actually have it, and didn't look especially quick out there. Tanev and Malkin looked terrific. Only brightspots tonight.

Letang had one of the dumbest games I've ever seen him have and boy has he had some dumb ones in the past. I'm not one of those wanting him gone either. I like him. But what an awful performance tonight.

 

[vodeni]

this team is just not used to play fast pressing game, the forwards are too slow and the newbies are quickly adopting lackadeisical approach. tanev and Geno are the only with the pulse. wonder what Guentzel is thinking. Hornquist is done. Defense is terrible. letang was outright scary, JJ, Guds and Peterson plain awful tonioght. Sit Guds and JJ try marino and Rikko, can't be worse.
I will keep my thoughts about Sully for a few more games, but martin and Recci should be long gone...this needs fresh blood...

 

[Bingo71]

Not worried. 81 games left

Games don’t matter until mid January.

 

[Pancakes]

Bottomline for me is the blueline looks like a mess. We will have a lot of problems if JJ and Gudbranson play this badly. We will have even worse problems if Letang and Dumo compound that by being as bad as they were tonight.

 

[Jaded-Fan]

It is just one game. However this was Tomlin level lack of being prepared for the first game. I get the defensive deficiencies but they mostly simply did not come prepared to play and mostly didn't put forth the sweat equity. Something we saw way too much of last year as well.

 

[reino]

I think Buffalo is better than most people think. Young super stars are in their prime now and they very good coach

 

[PenguinSuitedUp]

This looks like the Penguins teams of the past that used to rely on Crosby and Malkin to carry them through the regular season and into the playoffs. Except Crosby and Malkin may not have the legs to do that anymore.

In that regard, trading Kessel may have been the worst thing management could have done this offseason.

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

I think a competent defense with guys that can skate/move the puck goes an immeasurably long way toward fixing things. The forwards still need time to gel, but I'm not overly concerned with that aspect of the team. Geno's line looks great. Sid and Jake need someone who can play much more up-tempo than Hornqvist on that top line. A McCann/Hornqvist swap could end up solving both lines' problems. The fourth line looks rough, but they're all young kids trying to sort out playing a 4th line role, I think.

But the blueline's bad. Baaaaad. Dumo-Letang is our only competent pairing, and Letang was crap tonight. Petts needs to be with Schultz, too. The bottom pairing's gonna suck until we make some moves, but that's the way it is, I suppose. JR's arrogance and, quite frankly, stupidity, has us in a rough spot.

 

[CheckingLineCenter]

++ Tanev. He looks to be for real.
+ Geno. Moving really well out there
+ Murray. Team made it very hard on him tonight and he gave us a chance to win.

- - - - whole D group. Nobody had a good game. Horrendous stuff. Especially couldn’t control their own blueline.
- Letang. Not good, but he’ll be ok.
- Gudbranson. Can NOT afford for Guds to do this on a nightly basis. Has to show last year is sustainable.
- Odd man breaks are going to break Sullivan’s brain (and mine).
- Sid. Last guy I’m worried about, but he was pedestrian.
- Bjugstad. I’ve been a staunch defender but he stunk tonight, standing out in a night where everyone stunk.
- Effort/heart. Going got tough with the 2 penalties and a subsequent Sabres PP goal and we just rolled over.


Only 1 game, so no definitive statements or anything like that from me, but that was pretty bad. At least Murray and G showed up.

 

[turd]

Just one time, can we acknowledge that JJ and Gudbranson weren’t the main problems tonight and focus our complaints where they’re actually merited? Or is that too much to ask?

 

[Ugene Magic]

 

[Will Hunting]

Letang was awful. Crosby and Guentzel very weak. Also Hornqvist is not a 1st line material, very poor ES player. Tanev, Malkin and Murray our best players. Otherwise so predictable and still so sad. Exact copy of the Nyi series. 100% the same.

 

[Bingo71]

Letang is the Brett Favre of the NHL. Make the stupidest decisions time and time again that cost his team and then pulls a great play out of his ass and everyone ignores the dumbf***ery and claims he’s the greatest...

 

[Zirakzigil]

Somehow the coaching staff needs to brainwash the team into thinking the game is starting with them down by 2 and 5 minutes left. Too many sloppy plays. Definitely did not look like they were on the same page out there. Murray looks solid which is nice though.

 

[Empoleon8771]

I do know that good puck movers on defense directly correlate with being better offensively, but I feel like people don't mention enough how flawed the forward group is. It's not in as bad of a shape as the defense, but it's not in a good shape. It's way better on paper than it is in practice.

 

[Coastal Kev]

I don’t care what sport we are talking about, the most frustrating and mind numbing thing for fans is watching the same ****ing mistakes being made over and over again, after given lip service for an entire offseason about how things were going to be different.

A bunch of armchair quarterbacks can see this ****ing issues from our couches while eating a bag of chips but coaches and GMs can’t?

CLAPPIN up in here!

Please point to any changes that Sully brought to the table tonight going into the 3rd??? No sense of urgency. I guess you don't need one when you just signed a 4 year extension.

Sully sucks... pardon my spanish

 

[HuskerTornado]

this team is just not used to play fast pressing game, the forwards are too slow and the newbies are quickly adopting lackadeisical approach. tanev and Geno are the only with the pulse. wonder what Guentzel is thinking. Hornquist is done. Defense is terrible. letang was outright scary, JJ, Guds and Peterson plain awful tonioght. Sit Guds and JJ try marino and Rikko, can't be worse.
I will keep my thoughts about Sully for a few more games, but martin and Recci should be long gone...this needs fresh blood...

Probably too many White Claws.

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

Johnson only hurts the team for the ~12 minutes a night he plays at ES. You still have 35 minutes at ES without JJ, and even without JJ, this team got CAVED today.

Agreed, but again, someone saying "JJ gone doesn't fix shit on this team" is silliness. Removing a guy that is a front runner for the worst player, let alone blueliner, in the NHL isn't a "doesn't fix shit on this team" move.

 

[Tacitus Kilgore]

Oh this also a big reason why JR can't/shouldn't move our 1st this year

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

Oh sure man. But....it is way worse than one player. They need to excise like 8+ and the coaching staff. haha. damn.

I've been going to bat for Sully since I got here. I think he gets way too much flak, honestly. But if he's the one that's got JJ dressing nightly, and putting him with Schultz, then Sully's indefensible in that regard.

 

[canadianguy77]

Looked like Sid got frustrated and shot the puck into MPs skate because he and Gudbranson couldnt get the puck out. I thought that was funny.

 

[ColePens]

Calgary va Colorado right now is like watching an entirely different league.

Carolina/Montreal to me. There is so much excitement and so much energy.

 

[Empoleon8771]

I'm watching this Avs-Flames game, and I'm honestly starting to believe that this team's problems are majorly systematic. Both of these teams look dramatically faster than the Penguins and it's not because their rosters are better or faster. There are problems on the roster when it comes to speed and puck moving, but this team plays slower than it should on paper and has the same exact systematic problems it had last year.

This team plays slow and constantly gets burned defensively due to the sloppiness of their forwards or the dumbness of their defensemen. This team looks like it's playing in mud, it's not a fast paced team.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Trash. Pure trash.

 

[ColePens]

Shots: Buffalo 41 - Pens 29
Giveaways: Buffalo 6 - Pens 17
PP: Pens 1/5

YIKES