This entire situation remains a sad mess.
The playoff drought is now at an NHL-record 14 consecutive seasons, and even worse, the team keeps trending in the wrong direction.
The Buffalo Sabres enter Thursday’s regular-season finale with only 35 wins, which is four fewer than a year ago and seven fewer than two years when they actually got close to a playoff spot.
Tage Thompson, Rasmus Dahlin and Alex Tuch had big seasons, but the defensive play was a mess, the goaltending was bad, and they went into the season with more than $6 million in unused salary-cap space despite being desperate for the playoffs.