Rasmus Ristolainen Open To Trade
It’s been another trying year for the Buffalo Sabres, losing their coach and finishing dead last in the NHL. You can forgive a veteran player not wanting to go through that again, which makes Rasmus Ristolainen‘s comments to reporters including John Vogl of The Athletic and Mike Harrington of the Buffalo News today not much of a surprise:
I’m open for all the ideas. Right now, it’s hard. Obviously the season just ended so, yeah, I’m frustrated and I’m pissed and it sucks. So I told him I’m open for all the scenarios: staying or if he trades me, I’m fine with that too.
For me, I can’t go for another rebuild or wait multiple years. For me. I mean, we have to get to playoffs next year. For me, it’s either here or then somewhere else.
Ristolainen has now been in Buffalo for eight seasons but has yet to step foot on the ice of an NHL playoff game. He has seen six different coaches behind the bench since his debut in 2013, but none of them were able to get the team to even a .500 record. The 26-year-old defenseman has been a big part of those losses, averaging nearly 24 minutes a night throughout his Buffalo career, only to post an eye-popping -163 rating in 542 games. While +/- has its obvious flaws, Ristolainen has also posted poor possession numbers throughout his career and is likely playing a bigger role than he is truly capable of.
That is part of the problem in Buffalo, as the team hasn’t been able to truly build out the depth of the program even while selecting at the top of the draft. The chatter surrounding captain Jack Eichel continues to increase, while first-overall pick Rasmus Dahlin also experienced regression this season, posting just 23 points in 56 games.
As painful as it will be, the Sabres may need to try a rebuild again, moving out veterans like Ristolainen who don’t have much term left. The right-handed defenseman is signed through next season at a $5.4MM cap hit but is scheduled for free agency in the summer of 2022. Sam Reinhart, who is also one season away from UFA status, doesn’t even have a contract for next year yet. He told reporters that he doesn’t want to go through a rebuild either and hasn’t thought about his next contract yet. Reinhart is an arbitration-eligible restricted free agent this offseason.
GM Kevyn Adams has a busy summer in front of him, deciding which direction to take the Sabres for 2021-22.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images
Buffalo Sabres Sign Stefanos Lekkas
The Buffalo Sabres announced today that Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, Carter Hutton and Dustin Tokarski will all be unavailable for the last three games of the season, meaning it’s Michael Houser‘s net the rest of the way. He needs a backup of course, which is why the team signed Stefanos Lekkas to a one-year contract today.
Lekkas served as the backup for Houser last night on a professional tryout after the Sabres received an exception from the league, but he’ll now get an NHL deal for at least a few days. That’s quite a story for the 25-year-old, who joined the Rochester Americans on a PTO in March and played more at the ECHL level than the AHL this season.
While he still may not actually get into an NHL game, he will become a restricted free agent this summer and can always say he signed a big-league deal. Lekkas, who went undrafted, played four seasons at the University of Vermont and had an .863 save percentage in seven appearances for the Rochester Americans.
Poll: Who Finishes 30th In The NHL Standings?
Although they surely didn’t mean to, the Buffalo Sabres took some of the fun out of the stretch run this season by eliminating “tanking” storylines. Barring a stunning finish to their season (vs. NYI, at PIT, at PIT), the Sabres and their 33 points to date will finish as the wire-to-wire worst team in the NHL this season and will have the top odds in the NHL Draft Lottery.
Fortunately, that doesn’t mean there isn’t still some intrigue to the end of the season for the league’s bottom-dwellers. The race for 30th-place, the second-best lottery odds, is more important this year than most. The team finishing 29th and up this season will not have the lottery odds that typically correspond to their finish in the league standings. This is because the Seattle Kraken, the NHL’s new expansion team, will lay claim to the third-best odds. Changes to the draft lottery structure also means that the team finishing in 30th place can pick no later than fourth overall, but the team finishing in 29th place could fall as far as sixth overall this year.
Who do you think will finish 30th this year and secure those valuable second-best lottery odds? Better yet, which team has the incentive to actually “tank” their final few games in hopes of landing just behind the Sabres?
Anaheim Ducks (39 points)
Schedule: at STL, at STL, at MIN, at MIN
The Ducks are the only team in the NHL still statistically capable of finishing in last place. However, that would require the Sabres taking at least five of their final six points while the Ducks take two or less of their final eight (with the tie-breakers falling in Anaheim’s favor as well). With that said, the Ducks do have the best case for 30th right now. Their final four games are all on the road against West Division contenders. Two points back of the New Jersey Devils, who have a slightly lighter schedule, and even more so behind the other “tanking” contenders, Anaheim’s sights are set on that second-to-last finish. The one thing that could stop their pursuit: the Ducks are heating up at the wrong time; their 4-6-0 stretch in their last ten games is the best mark among the bottom five records in the NHL.
New Jersey Devils (41 points)
Schedule: vs. BOS, at NYI, at NYI, at PHI
Lottery winners in two of the past four drafts, the Devils have a taste for top picks and surely want to add to their collection of top prospects. New Jersey is “chasing” Anaheim, who has the same number of games remaining but have two points and an all-road schedule exclusively against playoff teams. However, the Devils have three playoff teams left on the docket as well and are unlikely to pick up any extra points in extra time with an 0-5 record in overtime and the shootout this season. Even losing out doesn’t guarantee the Devils 30th place, nor does a tie with Anaheim in the final standings given New Jersey’s regulation wins edge. Stranger things have happened though and both the Devils and Ducks have plenty of hockey still to play.
Columbus Blue Jackets (44 points)
Schedule: vs. NSH, vs. DET, vs. DET
The Blue Jackets have one fewer game left than the Ducks and Devils, which could benefit them. However, they also sit five and three points ahead respectively and the odds of picking up zero additional points with two games left against fellow bottom-feeder Detroit seems unlikely. What the Blue Jackets do have that the others don’t though is motivation. The Columbus pipeline is below average and vastly pales in comparison to Anaheim, New Jersey, and Detroit. The team could desperately use an elite prospect and may be willing to lose their final games in order to improve their odds of doing so.
Detroit Red Wings (45 points)
Schedule: at CLB, at CLB
Detroit has just two games left and they are both against a fellow un-contender. The Red Wings may have a one point lead on Columbus, but most would still bet on the Blue Jackets and it would not be a surprise to see Detroit finish the season as they stand now. However, that still means that Anaheim would need seven of eight points and New Jersey would need at least four of eight points in order to finish 30th. After the Red Wings got a raw deal in the lottery last season, maybe the hockey gods will look out for them. That might be the only way they finish second-to-last and occur a top-four pick again this season.
Who Finishes 30th In The NHL Standings?
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Anaheim Ducks 58% (535)
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New Jersey Devils 16% (148)
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Detroit Red Wings 15% (133)
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Columbus Blue Jackets 11% (99)
Total votes: 915
Michael Houser To Make NHL Debut
The Buffalo Sabres will have an unfamiliar face in net tonight when they take on the New York Islanders. Michael Houser will make his NHL debut after nearly a decade in the minor leagues, playing mostly in the ECHL.
The undrafted goaltender spent three seasons with the London Knights of the OHL and made his professional debut with the Cincinnati Cyclones in 2012. Since then he has been shipped around, suiting up for the San Antonio Rampage, Ontario Reign, Manchester Monarchs, Cleveland Monsters, Fort Wayne Komets, and Tucson Roadrunners. He has spent basically this whole season as a practice goaltender, not even seeing any action for the Rochester Americans. Houser’s last appearance was in March 2020 with the ECHL’s Cyclones.
Coming into the season, an NHL debut wasn’t even a possibility for Houser. The minor league veteran had signed an AHL deal meaning he couldn’t even serve as the taxi squad netminder. But after injuries started to pile up, the Sabres signed Houser to his first NHL deal on March 19 and kept him as the third goaltender while the rest of his position peers were coming in and out with various injuries. Now, after the latest Sabres netminder, Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen suffered a lower-body injury on Saturday, Houser will get the chance of a lifetime.
Grinding in the ECHL isn’t glamourous, but Houser has managed to make 255 appearances there over his long minor league career. He was named Goaltender of the Year in 2019 after posting a .922 save percentage, going 29-7-5 in the process. Excellence isn’t anything new to Houser, who was once named not only goalie of the year in the OHL but won the Red Tilson Trophy as the most outstanding player. It’s been a very long road since then, but the 28-year-old will now be in an NHL net for the first time.
The Sabres have also been given an exemption from the league in order to sign Stefanos Lekkas to a professional tryout. The 25-year-old undrafted netminder is in his first professional season after four years at the University of Vermont. He could serve as backup for Houser tonight, but won’t actually get an entry-level deal.
Shift To Center Could Bolster Sam Reinhart's Next Contract
As a result of the Sabres losing Jack Eichel to injury plus Eric Staal and Curtis Lazar to trades, the Sabres were forced to put Sam Reinhart back at center, a position he hasn’t played at much over the last few seasons. As Bill Hoppe of the Olean Times Herald points out, that position change has sparked the 25-year-old as he has 10 goals and five assists in 16 games since the move heading into tonight’s game against Boston. Reinhart is a restricted free agent for the final time this summer after avoiding arbitration last fall with a one-year, $5.2MM deal. That number represents his qualifying offer and if the team believes he can be a regular down the middle moving forward, he’d enter those contract discussions with a bit more leverage.
Linus Ullmark And Carter Hutton Unlikely To Return This Season
- The Sabres are unlikely to have goaltenders Linus Ullmark or Carter Hutton return this season, reports Mike Harrington of The Buffalo News. Ullmark has not yet resumed skating after suffering a lower-body injury two weeks ago while interim head coach Don Granato noted that Hutton recently had a setback after resuming skating as he worked his way back from a leg issue. That means that Dustin Tokarski and Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen will likely remain Buffalo’s tandem for the rest of the year.
Patrick Roy Interested In NHL Return
Patrick Roy is a Hall of Fame goaltender and a former NHL head coach and executive. However, since 2016 he’s been out of the league entirely. He’s now hoping to change that. According to agent Neil Glasberg, who was recently hired by Roy, the experienced hockey mind is looking for a way back to the top league in the world and he’ll take any opportunity that presents itself.
Roy is currently the head coach and general manager of the QMJHL’s Quebec Ramparts, a role he returned to in 2018 after previously working in those roles for the team since 2003. Of course, Roy was also the head coach and vice president of hockey operations for the Colorado Avalanche from 2013 to 2016.
With so much experience in various departments, Roy is not looking to focus on just one type of NHL opportunity. “He could be a president of hockey ops. He could be a GM. He could be a co-GM. He could be a head coach,” Glasberg stated. “It’s going to be situational.”
Roy had previously been linked to head coach and president opening with the Ottawa Senators and could circle back with the team on a potential role. His hometown Montreal Canadiens are currently operating with an interim head coach, as are the Buffalo Sabres, while there could be openings with the Detroit Red Wings and Columbus Blue Jackets among other this summer. In the front office, any number of teams could have openings – or make openings – in order to add Roy to the staff. As Glasberg notes, they will wait to see what becomes available this off-season and make a decision from there. With so many possibilities, the hope is to see Roy back in the NHL soon.
Debut Notes: Jones, Luukkonen, Foligno
The New York Rangers will have another exciting young defenseman in the lineup tonight when they take on the Philadelphia Flyers. Head coach David Quinn confirmed that Zac Jones will make his NHL debut, skating on the right side with Libor Hajek. Jones recently signed his entry-level contract after winning the national championship with UMass and will jump right into the fire of the NHL.
The 20-year-old defenseman scored 24 points in 29 games this season for the Minutemen and has quickly risen from mid-round lottery ticket to potential impact NHL player. Selected in the third round in 2019, the 5’10” Jones is a dynamic playmaker who glides smoothly around the ice controlling play in every inch of the rink. It’s hard to expect him to be as dominant right away for the Rangers, but he’ll get his first chance to show what he can do tonight.
- It likely won’t be tonight, but Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen is getting close to his NHL debut as well. The Buffalo Sabres goaltending prospect will back up Dustin Tokarski for the team tonight but is expected to start tomorrow’s game against the Boston Bruins in the second half of a back-to-back. The 22-year-old netminder has long been a top prospect and was selected 54th overall in 2017. In his one year of CHL hockey, he not only won the OHL Goaltender of the Year award but the Red Tilson Trophy as the league’s most outstanding player as well. He has been slowly built up in the Sabres development system since, spending time in the ECHL, AHL and even a short time back in Finland, but now will get his chance to see some NHL rubber.
- If you could pick a pair of linemates to skate beside in your first game for a new team, Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner aren’t bad choices. That’s what Nick Foligno is expected to get tonight as he makes his Toronto Maple Leafs debut, after serving his seven-day quarantine. Foligno came off the COVID Protocol Related Absences list and is ready to go, but tried to temper expectations by noting he hasn’t played in ten days. Expectations be damned; the Maple Leafs need a more consistent effort from their group after losing the last five games and barely holding onto their North Division lead.
Jack Quinn Undergoes Season-Ending Surgery
11:45am: The Sabres have announced that the surgery to repair a hernia was successful and confirmed that Quinn will miss the rest of the season. His recovery timeline has been put at six weeks, meaning he should be fully healthy by the time training camp starts for 2021-22.
10:30am: When the OHL season was officially canceled, it was good news for players like Jack Quinn. The Buffalo Sabres prospect could continue playing in the AHL where he is not usually eligible, speeding up his development timetable by playing against professionals on a nightly basis. For Quinn specifically, the news isn’t so great. Lance Lysowski of the Buffalo News is reporting that the young forward will undergo season-ending surgery on a lower-body injury that he has been dealing with for months. Because the decision was made now, Quinn will have time to train this summer after his recovery.
Though he might have just two goals in 15 games at the AHL level, the 19-year-old Quinn was coming along quite nicely in his post-draft year. Mike Harrington of the Buffalo News notes that the young forward had been playing center for the Rochester Americans and was likely in line to make his NHL debut at some point near the end of the season. The 8th overall pick in 2020, Quinn’s year will end with just nine points in 15 AHL games, though he also did take home a silver medal as part of Team Canada at the World Juniors.
It’s not an entirely lost year, but it certainly hasn’t been an easy one. Remember that Quinn and his Ottawa 67’s were denied an opportunity to play for a Memorial Cup in 2020. The team was 50-11-1 on the season, with Quinn and Minnesota Wild prospect Marco Rossi dominating on different lines. Now, a year later Quinn’s season comes to a disappointing end again.
Important to note that because he will not play seven games in the NHL this season, Quinn’s entry-level contract will slide forward a season. He will now be scheduled to reach restricted free agency after the 2023-24 season.
Buffalo Sabres Sign Lukas Rousek
The Buffalo Sabres have signed Czech forward Lukas Rousek to a two-year entry-level contract, according to his agent Dan Milstein of Gold Star Hockey. Milstein clarified to John Vogl of The Athletic that Rousek likely won’t be playing any AHL games this spring, given how long it would take him to get a visa and the short schedule remaining. The young forward will instead head to Buffalo early in the summer to train and his contract will begin in 2021-22.
It was quite the season for Rousek, who was just a sixth-round selection in 2019. After breaking out offensively last year for Sparta Praha, scoring 14 goals and 29 points in 52 games, the 22-year-old took his game to an entirely new level and racked up 38 points in 49 games for the 2020-21 season. That was good enough for 15th in the entire league, though actually just fourth on his team behind some of the league’s most respected names, including former NHL forward Michal Repik.
He went undrafted in his first two years of eligibility, but Rousek is proving that the Sabres were right in giving him a crack in 2019. A worthwhile pick, he’ll now have to try and make the transition to North American hockey and bring some of that offense to the AHL.