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Jack Eichel

Buffalo Sabres’ Jake McCabe Will Not Return To Game

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When Jake McCabe headed to the room earlier in tonight’s game against the Detroit Red Wings there was hope he would return. He’s now been ruled out with a shoulder injury, though it’s unclear how serious it is.

It’s just the latest in a season marred by injury for the Sabres, who have seen Jack Eichel, Zach Bogosian, Ryan O’Reilly, Evander Kane and others all miss time. The team look like it will now be without their top healthy left-handed defenseman, while they still wait for Dmitry Kulikov to make his return. Already a squad heavy on right-handers, Justin Falk now becomes the only healthy lefty.

The Sabres are at the bottom of the Eastern Conference for another year, and though it’s understandable through all the injuries it’s frustrating for fans of the team. It also must be causing a few gray hairs in the front office, as wasted seasons just bring the team closer to having to pay their young talent much bigger salaries. The team was supposed to take a step forward this year, but with the continuing injuries they just haven’t been able to find much consistency.

O’Reilly Returns To Lineup For Sabres

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The Buffalo Sabres will welcome center Ryan O’Reilly back to the lineup tonight with the team in Chicago to face the Blackhawks, according to Mike Harrington of  The Buffalo News. O’Reilly last played on December 23rd and has missed the last four games after undergoing an emergency appendectomy on December 27th. He was expected at the time to need 10 – 14 days to recover and it appears as if O’Reilly’s return comes slightly ahead of schedule.

O’Reilly currently ranks fourth on the Sabres in scoring with 17 points and his return couldn’t have come at a better time given the recent loss of Johan Larsson for the season. Head coach Dan Bylsma can use O’Reilly against the opposition’s top lines, thus freeing Jack Eichel to match-up against lesser competition.

Buffalo acquired O’Reilly from Colorado prior to the start of the 2015-16 season in a blockbuster deal that also brought forward Jamie McGinn to the Sabres. The Avalanche received Mikhail Grigorenko and defenseman Nikita Zadorov along with prospect J.T. Compher and a 2015 second-round pick in return. O’Reilly led the team in scoring last season with 60 points and posted the second 20-goal season of his seven-year career.

The Sabres went 2 – 2 – 0 in O’Reilly’s absence, sandwiching back-to-back, home-and-home losses to Boston with road wins over Detroit and the New York Rangers. They are tied for last in the Eastern Conference with the New York Islanders and trail the Bruins by eight points for the last guaranteed playoff spot in the Atlantic.

Snapshots: Russell, Eichel, Gilmour

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Oilers defenseman Kris Russell is a divisive figure in the hockey world. Stop me if you’ve heard this before.

Russell has five points (all assists) in 31 games with the Oilers, mostly playing on the team’s second pairing with Andrej Sekera. He’s been part of the best Oilers blue-line since 2008, and is considered one of the reasons that the Oilers are sitting in third in the Pacific Division and on pace for a 65-goal improvement in goal differential. The Oilers are 17-7-7 with Russell in the lineup and 2-5-0 without him.

However, hockey fans, executives, and experts are torn on Russell’s impact. Oilers GM Peter Chiarelli plans on discussing an extension with Russell’s camp and is on record as being “pretty happy” with Russell. That opinion is not shared by the majority of the analytics community, including Oilers blogger Darcy McLeod. McLeod’s analytical work is respected among the blogging community and appears regularly on TSN 1260 to discuss the Oilers. He took a closer look at the impact that Russell has on teammates, specifically the claims that Russell has a positive effect on “shooting percentage of team mates and zone exits that lead to offensive zone entries.”

Chiarelli has previously mentioned those two micro-stats as evidence for why he likes Russell. McLeod explored Russell’s effect on teammates in his two seasons with Calgary and all his games with the Oilers this season. The full article is well-worth the read. Ultimately, he concludes that the positive effect that Russell had on Flames teammates did not carry over to Edmonton, and that out of the Oilers’ four centers, only Mark Letestu scores better with Russell on the ice, writing that “if Russell excels at zone exits, these exits are not resulting in more goals for the Oilers.” Even Connor McDavid scores nearly a full point less per-60 minutes while sharing the ice with Russell.

McLeod writes that he still believes Russell is a valuable number-four or five defenseman, but doesn’t believe the Oilers should sign him long-term, with Oscar Klefbom, Andrej Sekera, Darnell Nurse, and Brandon Davidson all being left-handed defenders under contract and posting better results than Russell. A one-year, $3MM contract would be acceptable to McLeod, but signing Russell and trading any of the above-mentioned defensemen would be “a downgrade in the quality of the Left Handed Dcorps of the Edmonton Oilers.”

  • The second overall pick behind McDavid, Jack Eichel, expressed his disappointment with the way the Sabres’ season has gone so far. Despite the Sabres’ struggles (they’re currently last in the East), Eichel says the team hasn’t given up yet. He told John Vogl that “everyone needs to look in the mirror and we all need to get a lot better. I think I speak for the team in saying that we’re all frustrated with where we’re at, and I don’t think I’m the only person in the locker room that’s not satisfied.” It’s clear that Eichel is also stepping up as a leader in the locker room, and seems like the most-likely candidate to replace Brian Gionta as the next captain of the Sabres.
  • Monday marks the 25th anniversary of one of the most infamous trades in NHL history. On January 2, 1992, the Toronto Maple Leafs acquired Doug Gilmour in a 10-player trade with the Calgary Flames. The Leafs sent Gary Leeman, Craig Berube, Alexander Godynyuk, Michel Petit, and Jeff Reese to Calgary for Gilmour, Jamie Macoun, Kent Manderville, Ric Nattress, and Rick Wamsley. As with most controversial trades, it was immediately labelled as robbery by the Maple Leafs. In this case, that turned out to be quantifiably true. Sean McIndoe broke down the trade over at Sportsnet, and pointed out that if you remove Gilmour, the trade is just barely a wash for the Flames. But the trade did include Gilmour, who was recently named the 13th-best Maple Leaf of all time. He scored 452 points in 392 games during his first stint with the team, returning for just five shifts before suffering a career-ending injury in 2003.

 

Ryan O’Reilly Has Emergency Appendectomy, Out Indefinitely (Updated)

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(Update) 2:30pm: The Sabres announced via Twitter that O’Reilly will need “roughly 10 – 14 days of rest and recovery.”

10:34am: According to Mike Harrington of the Buffalo News, Sabres alternate captain Ryan O’Reilly had an appendectomy on Christmas Day and is out indefinitely. While this isn’t a long-term issue, Buffalo has been struck with injuries all season and won’t get a break any time soon.

The team is at 12-13-8 and has missed O’Reilly, Evander Kane, Zach Bogosian, Jack Eichel and others for lengthy periods already. While the team hoped to have competed for a playoff spot this season after signing Kyle Okposo to a big offseason contract and pursuing several other big-name free agents, they’ve been snake-bitten all year and have fallen further and further behind. Their 32 points puts them dead last in the Atlantic Division, tied with the New York Islanders for last in the conference.

O’Reilly, who missed time with back spasms earlier this year, has been one of their most effective forwards when healthy with 18 points in 27 games. The 25-year old is in the first year of his long-term extension signed in 2015. While his cap hit will be $7.5MM for the next seven seasons, he’ll actually earn $11MM in salary (including signing bonuses) this year.

All Buffalo fans can do is shake their head at this point and hope that a quick return is in the cards for O’Reilly. As Harrington reports, other players like Max Pacioretty, Jamie Benn and Corey Crawford have returned within a few weeks of their surgery.

*Glen Miller contributed to this post.

Atlantic Notes: Sabres Struggles, Red Wings, Senators

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The Buffalo News’ Mike Harrington opines that the Sabres need to turn things around fast during a season that was supposed to be more successful. Harrington wonders if head coach Dan Bylsma is heading down “Ryan Road,” a nod to the embattled Buffalo Bills head coach, Rex Ryan. From Harrington:

Lately, it seems as if Bylsma has lost his mind. It’s to the point where it’s now an open discussion among Sabres fans if Bylsma, in just the second year of a five-year contract, should be heading down Ryan Road to the unemployment line too if his team continues to implode.

From there, Harrington lists a number of Byslma missteps which include everything from benching Jack Eichel on the power play to a philosophy that doesn’t seem to benefit the team, and instead, makes them less sure of what they’re doing. He also lays blame at the feet of general manager Tim Murray, imploring him to make a trade for a defenseman desperately needed by the team.

Not letting anyone off the hook, Harrington takes aim at ownership, wondering what their plan is after six years of no playoff appearances. He adds that it feels like nothing more than regrets for what they don’t have, and that the Sabres have played second fiddle to other teams when it comes to acquiring someone who can help Buffalo escape its recent culture of losing.

  • The Sabres head into Detroit to take on the other team jostling for the basement of the Atlantic. MLive’s Ansar Khan reports that Detroit needs to “chip away” at the deficit they face in the division and conference. Khan offers salvation in the way of listing three teams (Philadelphia, Tampa Bay, and eventual champ Pittsburgh) who were outside of the playoff hunt looking in last year at this time. But the Red Wings, fairly or unfairly, do not have the star power of a Pittsburgh or Tampa Bay. Khan believes that in order to ascend, the Wings must take advantage of beating the “bad” teams and Buffalo offers a chance to take advantage of this. The power play must also improve, as Detroit has the worst man advantage success rate in the league, and historically, it’s one of the worst during the entire salary cap era. Khan also thinks that help is on the way with Mike Green, Alexey Marchenko, Tyler Bertuzzi and Justin Abdelkader on the mend.
  • The Ottawa Citizen takes a look at the Senators by the numbers and finds that the team has a lot to be proud of as the new year approaches. The most compelling number? -1: the goal differential of a team in playoff position. It’s noted, however, that four others teams sitting in playoff spots are also sporting negative goal differentials, but those teams (Boston, Anaheim,  St. Louis,  and Calgary) are worse in that category than the Sens.

Atlantic Notes: Sabres, Matthews, Coreau

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The Sabres gave a performance worthy of Grinch-like proportions writes the Buffalo News’ Mike Harrington. Approaching the holiday season, the Sabres gave their fans a performance akin to receiving coal at Christmas. Losing 3-1 to the Hurricanes Thursday evening, the Sabres were serenaded with boos from the home crowd at multiple points of the game Harrington reports.  More importantly, Harrington continues, are Jack Eichel’s struggles and how it has affected the team. Harrington talked to the young star after the game, who was “seething” with head coach Dan Bylsma’s decision to take away ice time. From Harrington:

Asked if he was surprised to not be on the ice, the 20-year-old said the time to discuss the topic was over.

“I think I just answered that. I’m not the coach,” he said. “Like I said, we had a lot of opportunities on the first power play. … I was on the second power play. I’m out there working hard. I think that’s all I really have to say about that.”

Bylsma was “unusually intense” during the morning skate, but his teaching apparently fell on deaf ears. Worse, Buffalo slipped into a tie with Detroit for last place in the Atlantic with the loss. Harrington writes that redemption could come in the way of beating the New York Islanders tonight.

Dec 22, 2016; Denver, CO, USA; Toronto Maple Leafs center Auston Matthews (34) celebrates with teammates after scoring a goal in the first period against the Colorado Avalanche at the Pepsi Center. Mandatory Credit: Isaiah J. Downing-USA TODAY Sports

  • Auston Matthews is set to play his first game in his home state tonight, and the excitement for his return is through the roof writes NHL.com’s Dan Rosen. From Arizona youth hockey teams to Matthews’ own parents, the entire state of Arizona has been waiting to see their homegrown son return to where many thought hockey would never last. Instead, the #1 overall pick in the 2016 draft not only hails from the non-traditional hockey market of Arizona, he’s the face of the organization that many consider the epicenter of the hockey world. Matthews’ importance to the state of Arizona goes beyond just local pride. It’s the idea, Rosen continues, that Arizona finally has relevancy in hockey’s eyes.
  • Jared Coreau is set to start in net tonight for the Detroit Red Wings tweets MLive’s Brendan Savage. Head coach Jeff Blashill broke the news to Petr Mrazek, who has struggled to keep hold of the starting job in light of Jimmy Howard’s strong play. Savage adds that Blashill said he wants players to “want to be in” and though they may not agree, Savage tweets that Blashill declares that he has the final say. This season, Mrazek is 9-7-3 with an .899 save percentage. His struggles are one of many on the team this year that has landed the Red Wings in a tie for last place in the division.

Snapshots: Kings, Hunlack, Bogosian

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In his latest column, ESPN Insider Pierre LeBrun takes a look at the Los Angeles Kings roster and suggest strategies for the upcoming expansion draft. LeBrun boils the issue down to two names: Brayden McNabb and Dustin Brown. If the team wishes to protect McNabb, they’ll have to go the “eight skaters” option, since Drew Doughty, Jake Muzzin and Alec Martinez will undoubtedly need protection. If they do, they put at risk some of their big names up front, including former captain Dustin Brown. While Brown is coming off the worst year of his career, he’s turned it around a bit this season and may be an interesting option for the Vegas team to bring in a veteran forward who could immediately become their first captain.

On the other hand, if they choose to leave McNabb exposed he may not necessarily be the selection since he only has one year remaining before becoming a highly sought after free agent in 2018. At 27, the shutdown defender would have teams lining up to bring him into the fold, and he’ll be looking for a substantial raise from the $1.8MM he’ll make next season.  For the Kings, just like every other team, the expansion draft will be a game of chicken with George McPhee and the Vegas front office.

  • In Toronto, a nickname has surfaced for the veteran third pairing of Matt Hunwick and Roman Polak; “Hunlack”, as many fans refer to the duo has been chided incessantly by the analytics community for their constant struggle with possession metrics. While the two rank terribly in terms of Corsi and Fenwick, head coach Mike Babcock dismisses the notion that they’re unplayable. When asked by Chris Johnston of Sportsnet what makes up a good game for them, Babcock replied “There’s a bunch of ways to look at the game. So Corsi’s one, maybe. But who turns the video on and rewinds to see if those shots actually hit the net or not? Because our math and theirs don’t add up. So what I do is I say: ’Did the puck go in or did they get scoring chances against?'” While the metrics available to the public don’t necessarily share Babcock’s assesment of the pairing, he does seem to imply that the Maple Leafs’ internal numbers don’t match up exactly.  Perhaps even though ’Hunlack’ doesn’t generate shots like Toronto’s other pairings, they can be effective in other ways – or maybe it’s just talking them up for the trade deadline.
  • For Buffalo, their season-long struggle with injuries is starting to see an end. After Jack Eichel has rejoined the team and shown why he shouldn’t be forgotten as last season’s second-overall pick, the team got more good news today. Zach Bogosian, out since the beginning of November with a knee injury, took full part in today’s practice and should be back before long. Now they just have to figure out a way to motivate Zemgus Girgensons and Evander Kane, both of whom will skate on the fourth line tonight against the Los Angeles Kings.

Sabres Notes: Girgensons, Eichel, Okposo, Bogosian

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As part of his latest 30 Thoughts column, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reports that the Sabres are receiving calls regarding struggling forward Zemgus Girgensons.  The Latvian has seen his role and ice time decrease in recent weeks and has found himself on the fourth line lately.

The 22 year old former first rounder (14th overall in 2012) is only two years removed from a 30 point season, one where he only played in 61 games.  Since then, under new head coach Dan Bylsma, Girgensons has just 23 points in 99 games and just five of those have come this season.

Despite playing less and less, GM Tim Murray is telling teams that the asking price on Girgensons isn’t dropping simply because he isn’t playing well right now.  While there’s no word on what the cost would be to get him, Friedman notes that the Ducks showed some interest last summer but Buffalo was asking for one of Anaheim’s young defensemen in return, a price they clearly weren’t willing to pay.

With a cap hit of $1.15MM, Girgensons is cheap enough to fit on the cap for most teams if the Sabres eventually get what they’re looking for in a trade.  He will be a restricted free agent once again this offseason after settling on a one year deal back in September.

More from Buffalo:

  • In their 6-3 win over Los Angeles last night, the Sabres paired up Kyle Okposo and Jack Eichel for the first time and as Mike Harrington of the Buffalo News notes, the two showed some instant chemistry as they combined for six points. This combination was likely envisioned back in the summer when Okposo signed a seven year deal but an early season ankle injury to Eichel shelved those plans, at least temporarily.
  • Also from Harrington, defenseman Zach Bogosian skated for the first time on Tuesday since suffering a sprained MCL back on November 1st. There remains no timetable for his return, however.  Although Bogosian was off to a tough start before going down (no points in nine games), he has logged heavy minutes for the Sabres since being acquired from Winnipeg back in February of 2015.

Atlantic Division Snapshots: Pastrnak, Sabres, Ryan

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The Boston Bruins may be in the midst of a mediocre season but one bright spot, both today and for the future, has been the breakout performance of 20-year-old winger David Pastrnak. The Czech born forward has 18 goals in just 23 games to start the 2016-17 campaign, a figure which has already eclipsed his career-high by three. Pastrnak is playing out the final season of his ELC and presuming he’s able to continue to pile up the points, it’s certain he will cash in big this summer on a new contract, as Joe Haggerty of CSNNE writes.

Granted, it’s unlikely Pastrnak, who is also averaging better than a point-per-game, will be able to maintain his scoring pace throughout the season but his prolific start makes it easy to envision a 30-goal, 60-point campaign is a strong possibility. Haggerty speculates that if Pastrnak reaches those plateaus, he would be in line for a deal comparable to those awarded to Johnny Gaudreau, Sean Monahan and Nathan MacKinnon, among others in recent seasons. That means the value of a multiyear arrangement could reach $6MM or more annually on a long-term deal, depending on how many free agent years Boston is able to secure.

While the Bruins would certainly be more than happy to lock up the services of a talented youngster like Pastrnak through his prime seasons at that price, there is what Haggerty considers a “nightmare scenario,” that could come into play. If Pastrnak continues filling the net consistently and posts a platform season similar to that which Vladimir Tarasenko posted in 2014-15 – 37 goals and 73 points – his price tag could go well beyond the $6MM – $6.5MM mark. Tarasenko inked an eight-year, $60MM pact with the Blues on the heels of his breakout campaign two years ago and that could represent a target for Pastrnak if his able to attain that level of offensive production. With the salary cap likely to remain at or near the $73MM mark, and after locking up winger Brad Marchand to a lucrative new deal earlier this year, the Bruins will have to hope they can get Pastrnak extended at a rate which better fits their long-term salary cap situation.

Elsewhere in the Atlantic Division:

  • The Buffalo Sabres, led by sophomore Jack Eichel and buoyed by an owner willing to spend to improve his club, would certainly have to be considered a team on the rise in the Atlantic Division. While a postseason berth in 2016-17 might be a long shot at this point, the Sabres should begin to contend for the playoffs as soon as next season. However, as John Vogl of The Buffalo News notes, the situation today could be much different had the club done a better job of drafting in the early-to-mid-2000’s. Former first and second-round choices taken while Darcy Regier was the team’s GM listed by Vogl include: Marek Zagrapan, Philipp Gogulla, Dennis Persson and Drew Schiestel were all high draft picks chosen between 2005 and 2007 and none even played a single NHL game. Conversely, players the Sabres could have selected – Alec Martinez, James Neal and T.J. Oshie – have played key roles for contending teams. While it may be fun to play “what if,” with players the Sabres could have had, it’s also important to note that had the team experienced more success as a result of better drafting under Regier, Buffalo would likely not have franchise building blocks Rasmus Ristolainen, Eichel, Sam Reinhart and Alexander Nylander in the organization today.
  • The return of Bobby Ryan and the play of several of Ottawa’s younger forwards has allowed first-year GM Pierre Dorion to resist temptation and stay the course with the team’s current roster, writes Ken Warren of the Ottawa Sun. It would have been understandable if Dorion had looked to make a deal to add some extra offense with Ryan out with a hand injury but the veteran scoring winger missed only three games. Dorion admitted he made some calls in the aftermath of the Ryan injury and while he will continue to look at different avenues to improve his club, there is no immediate pressure to make a trade.

Atlantic Division Snapshots: Sabres, Huberdeau, Stralman, Ottawa Arena

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Two years ago the Buffalo Sabres finished with the worst record in the NHL and were outscored by an astounding 113 goals. This was largely by design as the team was in the midst of a full rebuild and the 2015 entry draft boasted two top talents in Connor McDavid and Jack Eichel. Sabres management knew if they wanted to secure a true franchise player they would need to finish at the bottom of the NHL standings.

That season the Sabres scored the fewest goals in the league and as bad as their offense was then, this year’s edition is so far even worse. During the 2014-15 campaign Buffalo averaged a meager 1.96 goals-per-game. This season the team is averaging just 1.86 goals-per-game. The team has struggled even more in the month of November, tallying just 19 goals in 13 games.

Even without Eichel, who has been out all season with an ankle injury, the Sabres were expected to mount a more prolific offensive attack. But as John Vogl of the Buffalo News writes, while the team is struggling to put the puck in the net, they are generating plenty of chances.

Ryan O’Reilly, who was acquired from Colorado in a blockbuster deal during the summer of 2015, has been counted on to lead the offense with Eichel on the shelf. He has nine points in 15 games on the campaign, but just one goal in his last 12, and he expects more from himself.

“It’s frustrating. It’s scoring goals again is the problem, and that’s my job. I’m not doing it right now.”

“We’ve got to shoot the puck better. It’s that simple. We’re moving it well. We’re supporting each other. We’re getting these good looks, but it’s beating the goalie. That’s all it is. It starts with myself. I’ve got to do that.”

Goaltender Anders Nilsson feels that the team is overdue for a little luck.

“We don’t get those dirty goals, and we don’t get those goals off the post and in or off a shin pad and in. We have to work really hard for every goal we score. Hopefully, we can turn that around and get the bounces with us.”

It does appear as if Eichel should be back in the lineup in relatively short order but even without their franchise center, the Sabres boast a talented group of forwards who are capable of putting the puck in the net. Kyle Okposo has topped the 20-goal mark three times in his career while Evander Kane has done so twice, including last season. Matt Moulson has three 30-goal campaigns on his resume and O’Reilly has tallied at least 50 points in four of the last five seasons. Once Eichel is back on the ice, the Sabres should be able to get their offense back on track.

  • Like Buffalo, the Florida Panthers have been without one of their top players all season. Jonathan Huberdeau injured his Achilles during training camp and was expected to miss three to four months. According to George Richards of the Miami Herald, Huberdeau is progressing in his rehab but is still not expected back in action for a while. Panthers bench boss Gerard Gallant described the recovery time line as between four and six months, which indicates Huberdeau could be out for much of the regular season.
  • The news is better for the other Florida team as Anton Stralman appears to be nearing a return to the Tampa Bay Lightning lineup. Bryan Burns, who covers the Lightning for NHL.com, tweeted that head coach Jon Cooper said the blue liner could see action on the team’s upcoming road trip. Stralman has been out the last two weeks with an upper-body-injury. Stralman has seven points in 15 games this season and is averaging better than 22 minutes per contest.
  • A new arena for the Ottawa Senators appears to be one step closer to a reality, as Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Citizen writes. The National Capital Commission (NCC) has given its formal approval for negotiations between the federal government and RendezVouz LeBreton to proceed. Garrioch adds that the Rogers Place Arena Ice District in Edmonton has provided the perfect model for what the Senators want to build in Ottawa. One NCC board member is impressed with how the Rogers project revitalized the downtown area in Edmonton and hopes a new arena will do the same in Canada’s capital.

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