Six games into the 2025-26 Buffalo Sabres season and the team sits at 2-4-0 which ties them for last place in the conference. That is not good. But there are some positive indications behind that sub-mediocre record. Let’s take a look. 

The Good:

Alex Lyon has delivered to the Sabres some of the best drought-era goaltending with his .924 save percentage through six games. Unfortunately for him, the team has only managed to score 15 goals which is the second fewest in the Eastern Conference. This is because the Sabres are only legally allowed to have either good goaltending or good goalscoring, but not both at the same time. It is worth mentioning that goaltender Ukko Pekka Luukkonen was assigned to a conditioning stint with the Rochester Americans on Thursday which is a good indication that he should be coming back to the Sabres soon.

Like Lyon, forward Josh Doan has been a welcome addition to the club. Through six games, the Scottsdale native has 5 points (2 goals, 3 assists) along with some truly fantastic underlying numbers: He leads the team in even-strength Corsi-For Percentage (61.3%) and is second in Fenwick for at 57.45, just behind Zach Benson, according to Hockey Reference. This is not just a matter of feasting on offensive zone starts, either; Doan is ranked 14th out of 23 skaters for the Sabres in even-strength offensive zone starts.

Kevyn Adams’s trade of JJ Peterka for Josh Doan and Michael Kesselring has the potential to be one of the better win-win NHL trades in recent history if Doan can maintain his play and Kesselring returns from injury looking like a bona fide top-4 defender. The defense even without Kesselring has been pretty solid – they’ve only allowed 18 goals which is the second fewest in the division.

The penalty kill has been one area where the defensive improvement has been especially noticeable as the team has the highest penalty killing percentage at 95.8%. While that percentage is obviously not sustainable over the entirety of a season, it is worth noting that the Sabres currently have as many goals-for shorthanded (1) as they do goals against on the penalty kill.

The Bad:

As was eluded to earlier, the Sabres have a major scoring problem that is only exacerbated by mediocre scoring performances from top players Rasmus Dahlin, Tage Thompson and Alex Tuch who have combined for just two goals so far on the season. That is obviously not going to get it done if the Sabres are going to break their playoff drought.

Perhaps they could survive this lull in production from the top line if they were getting surprise production from the fourth line, but Lindy Ruff’s fourth line doesn’t even really play hockey. Josh Dunne is averaging 6:30 minutes a game while Mason Geertsen is averaging a meager 4:12 per game. The latter has nearly as many penalty minutes (12) as he does total time on ice (16:47 per game) through four games. Noah Ostlund, by the way, was called up from Rochester prior to the game against Montreal and he watched the contest from the press box. Perhaps he could help score some goals. Ruff’s usage of Dunne and especially Geertsen is borderline bizarre at this point.

The Ugly:

Injuries have killed this team early on. Kevyn Adams’s decision to not replace Peterka became a major problem only one game into the season when Josh Norris got hurt (again). It sure would have been nice if Adams had utilized his $5m in cap space to attempt to bring in a veteran player who could move up the roster when the Norris injuries inevitably pop up.

This isn’t helped by the coaching decisions, either. Lindy Ruff refuses to play Tage Thompson at center which means the center spine of Jiri Kulich, Ryan McLeod, Peyton Krebs and Tyson Kozak has to pick up the slack. They have not been up to the task so far. The combination of Ruff’s stubbornness on the Thompson-at-center debate coupled with Adams’s inaction on the trade front has the possibility to sink the season before Thanksgiving (again).

If Ruff isn’t willing to play Thompson at center then they need to think about playing Konsta Helenius or Noah Ostlund instead of Dunne and Geertsen. The team simply doesn’t have the firepower to compete as currently constructed.