BUFFALO, N.Y. — Jarmo Kekäläinen saw this summer coming. When he joined the Buffalo Sabres as a senior adviser last summer, the staff walked him through each player, how they were acquired and where they fit into the roster build. He then had a front-row seat to the team’s initial negotiations with Alex Tuch and Bowen Byram last offseason.
So when Kekäläinen stepped into the general manager position in December, he knew there was a gap between the Sabres and Tuch in negotiations. And he knew Byram was unwilling to extend long-term because of his desire to be a No. 1 defenseman. So while the Sabres were going on a second-half run for the ages and made the playoffs for the first time in 15 years, Kekäläinen knew change was coming. In both cases, he tried to convince the players to change their minds, but he knew he needed to have a plan for life without Tuch and Byram.
“Basically, we thought about it every day since last offseason,” Kekäläinen told The Athletic in a sit-down interview following free agency.
July 1 was not a busy day for the Sabres, and that was by design. Buffalo has 14 forwards on the roster with RFA Peyton Krebs still to sign. The Sabres also have seven defensemen and three goalies under contract. Any free-agent signing would have necessitated a trade to move somebody else off the roster. Kekäläinen feels the Sabres addressed Byram’s departure by adding Olen Zellweger and Louis Crevier, who will both compete for top-four minutes. From the beginning, Kekäläinen has been comfortable with the internal options to replace Tuch. Zach Benson, Josh Doan, Jack Quinn, Konsta Helenius, Noah Östlund and Jiri Kulich all have room to grow and replace some of Tuch’s production.
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But beyond that, Kekäläinen is thinking about the Sabres’ competitive window. They were a goal away from reaching the Eastern Conference final. Tage Thompson is 28 and has four years left on a bargain contract. The rest of the Sabres’ core players are 26 and younger. They were one of the youngest teams in the NHL. So the balancing act is capitalizing in the short-term without compromising what could be a long competitive window.
“That’s what we think about all the time,” Kekäläinen said. “Even referring back to the Tuch situation, we’re watching Östlund, Helenius, Jack Quinn, Doan, Benson, all of those guys. How are they coming along in their career? How are they developing? What kind of role can they take a year from now, two years from now? I’d say our window is open right now, and I think it’s only going to get wider. That’s how I would put it. You look at the teams that were in the Stanley Cup; it doesn’t happen like this where the window opens, and first year you win. It usually happens where you learn from experience, like we did this year. We won the first round, went to Game 7, one shot away from being in the conference final. That’s a valuable experience. Now, how do we get to the next level? Carolina, for example. How many times were they disappointed before they finally got over the hump?”
It’s worth noting the Hurricanes and Canadiens, the last two teams standing in the Eastern Conference, were also quiet during the first wave of free agency. Neither team has made a substantial move to improve their team. Yes, the Sabres lost Byram and Tuch. But Kekäläinen sees a lot of what he needs on the roster.
“We’ve got to keep growing,” Kekäläinen said. “I think internal growth is a huge part of it. These guys get more experience, and they get stronger. I think that’s where our core grows. We’re going to be in this window for a while where Rasmus Dahlin still has a lot of runway. All of our so-called older guys are still going to be in their prime for quite a while. The young guys are just getting into their primes. It’s exciting. I think we’re in a really good spot where we don’t have to get busy on July 1. That’s the way I would categorize it. If we’re really busy on July 1, we’re either desperate or we don’t have a very good team. And we have a very good team, so we don’t have to get into the desperate moves. We could just look at our group and say we’re going to get better and we’re going to grow. If there’s the right piece there that fits perfectly, let’s do it.”
Sabres fans are scarred by the idea of banking on internal growth. Buffalo banked on that under former general manager Kevyn Adams after coming up one point short of the playoffs in 2022-23. Relying on young players led to significant regression. The difference, though, is that this team got to the playoffs, and the young players were the ones who stepped up when the Sabres got there. With another season, Kekäläinen will have even more clarity on exactly what Östlund, Helenius and Kulich can become and can adjust accordingly.
Next summer, the Sabres’ cap situation will improve, too. PuckPedia projects the Sabres will have roughly $40 million in cap space with 13 players under contract. Östlund and Quinn are the two most significant restricted free agents next summer. Avoiding the Byram and Tuch contracts makes it easier for Kekäläinen to jump on a timely trade when it’s there. The right deal hasn’t been there so far this summer. But that moment is coming, whether it’s later this summer, during the season or next summer.
“That’s why you need flexibility and cap space so when that comes now you have the ability to do that instead of scrambling to get rid of something to be able to do that,” Kekäläinen said. “Our depth chart is in a good spot with the prospects that we have. Everybody is asking about our young players because they’re good. We have no interest in parting ways with them now when that could bite us in the ass in the next 15 years.”
That’s why Kekäläinen didn’t mind sitting tight and making both of Buffalo’s first-round picks at four and 20 last week. The Sabres’ prospect pool is already strong, and it got even stronger with the additions of Daxon Rudolph and Ilia Morozov.
“You were mentioning about that right moment to do a trade that really takes us to the next level, you have to have a strong depth chart of prospects,” Kekäläinen said. “That’s what it’s for. When you have the luxury of so many good players, that, yes we can trade one of the prospects or two of the prospects to get this guy who can make an impact. That’s why we sometimes call them assets. They’re human beings, but sometimes we call them assets because you can use them to do something that gives you the immediate help. But you don’t want to use them for rentals.”
Kekäläinen sees what’s happening around the Sabres in the Atlantic Division. The Maple Leafs have made moves to try to make last season a one-year blip. The Florida Panthers are back healthy and with an even stronger forward group than they had when they won the Stanley Cup. But Kekäläinen looks at the Panthers as a team that has to win now with the age of their core. In his eyes, the Sabres’ window is just opening.
That doesn’t mean the Sabres aren’t trying to improve on what they did in 2025-26. Kekäläinen is confident in this roster, but he’s still open to the right trade or signing. As things stand, though, Buffalo’s roster is full. Any move would require moving someone else out, so it has to be a clear upgrade.
“It’s a 23-man roster,” Kekäläinen said. “With the players we have right now, it’s going to be a heck of a battle in training camp, and there’s going to be some disappointed players that are probably NHL players but can’t fit on the 23-man roster. That creates another challenge, but I think it’s a good challenge and a great problem to have. I think we’re in a great spot where we don’t have to be busy on July 1.”
That was particularly true this year with a dearth of impact players available in free agency. Kekäläinen likes what he sees on the roster. And based on his conversations with his peers around the league, he knows others feel the same way about Buffalo’s young players. When the time comes, he’ll be ready to add to this group. He showed that at the trade deadline by making a serious run at Colton Parayko. He’s been involved in plenty of trade talks this summer. But because of what the Sabres have on the roster, Kekäläinen doesn’t feel like he’s entering those trade talks from a point of desperation.
“I can talk all I want,” Kekäläinen said. “But even if you ask people around the league in my chair and people that have been around a lot, they all view the Buffalo Sabres as one of the teams that is really coming.”