Columbus, OH (WGR) – The Buffalo Sabres open the season in Columbus on Thursday and they got some good news. Mattias Samuelsson is ready to go and will play. Buffalo is still banged up on the blue line with Oleg Zellweger and Conor Timmins out so Matt Grzelcyk and Zach Metsa are in the lineup. Dennis Gilbert was called up from Rochester to be the seventh defensemen should an injury happen in warmup.
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen gets the call in net. Last season he was 22-9-3 with a 2.49 goals against and .910 save percentage.
Lindy Ruff has been around the NHL since 1979, but he said opening night is still the best,
“Yes, there’s excitement, I’ve had a chance for a couple of nights to look around the league to see what’s going on and I think there’s been some erratic play, so we know we’ve got to put the work in, use our speed and be ready to go.”
The Sabres have tended to start season slowly for a long time. Ruff said he know the formula to make sure that doesn’t happen this season,
“Be ready to out work and out skate the opposition in Game 1. Play our game better than they’re going to play their game, but don’t take any shift for granted.”
There’s been a lot of discussion about playing Jiri Kulich on the left wing with Sam Carrick and Back Malenstyn. That’s the line he’s going to start on Thursday and Ruff said there is a method to his madness,
“In the preseason I tried to use him for key faceoffs and I liked him more playing center than I did wing, so we’ve put him in the middle there, but I can’t emphasis enough how valuable that line was, even in a lot of road games we went on, I think he can be a big asset down there and he’s a guy that if somebody’s struggling and we need to move him up or someone is struggling in the faceoff circle, we can bump him up.”
Right before the morning skate the Sabres announced that newly acquired defenseman Louie Crevier has signed a four year contract extension that will pay him and average of $4 million per season. Ruff is happy to have him,
“When I’ve watched him at practice we’ve had lots of discussions about him, we’ve watched him in the games, he’s moved the puck well and skated well, but there was a little concern coming off (shoulder) surgery this summer, but everything looks great and I think this will be a great fit for our hockey club.”
Crevier just turned 25 in May. He said he wanted to get a new contract out of the way,
“I’m really happy, it’s something I’ve worked for for awhile now and I’m just super glad that it’s behind me, just having stability I think will help me a ton to play hockey.”
It has seemed like Crevier has fit right in with this team right from the start. He said,
“First of all everyone was really welcoming and since it happened in the summer, I was free to process more and more information, learn names and stuff even before I came into Buffalo, so I think that helped a lot, it was just super easy honestly.”
Since training camp opened, Crevier has played with Timmins, Rasmus Dahlin and now Owen Power on opening night. He said getting a chemistry with all of them isn’t hard.
“I think they’re all really good players, so it helps a lot and in Chicago it was the same even earlier in the year last year, we were playing seven defensemen, so I feel like I’m used to playing with different guys.”
Of all the seventh rounders taken in the 2020 NHL Draft, Crevier has played 134 games. Next is Ilya Solovyov of the Pittsburgh Penguins with 45 and former Sabre and now Edmonton Oiler Devon Levi with 39.
Join Zach Jones and Derek Kramer for the pregame starting at 6:00 when you’ll hear from Ruff, Dahlin, Luukkonen and Crevier.
THURSDAY’S LINES:
Norris – Thompson – Doan
Benson – Ostlund – Quinn
Krebs – McLeod – Helenius
Malenstyn – Kulich – Carrick
Dahlin – Samuelsson
Grzelcyk – Metsa
Power – Crevier