One of these days, the Bruins\u2019 struggle to score goals will cost them. But the Buffalo Sabres, forever searching for traction in the Atlantic Division and missing a couple of of their best forwards because of injury (Josh Norris and Zach Benson), were not the team to make them pay for it on Saturday at the Garden.<\/p>\n
The B\u2019s had countless chances to put the Sabres away but it wasn\u2019t until Sean Kuraly tapped in Elias Lindholm\u2019s pass that was headed into the empty net with a 2.2 seconds left in the third period could the B\u2019s rest easy, taking home a 3-1 win and improving their record to 3-0 on the young season.<\/p>\n
But we all knew that this team was not going to be an offensive juggernaut. The question was whether new coach Marco Sturm was going to be able to whip this team into the hard-to-play-against, defensively sound unit they were designed to be.<\/p>\n
The answer after three games is a resounding \u201cyes\u201d and the players are enjoying themselves. It feels like a team again.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s huge,\u201d said Mark Kastelic, whose work ethic was on full display all night and whose deflected shot stood up as the GWG. \u201cThe energy in here right now is amazing. It\u2019s truly just a great room to come into every day, right from the staff on down to the boys. Everybody\u2019s just coming to the rink with a smile and coming to the rink to get better each and every day.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Bruins played their most dominant period of the season in the opening 20 minutes, outshooting the Sabres 17-2 \u2013 it felt like it was even more lopsided \u2013 but they managed just a 1-0 lead.<\/p>\n
The goal came on their 14th shot of the period at 15:48 and for the second time in as many games, it was the second line that gave the B\u2019s the first lead of the game.<\/p>\n
Jordan Harris, making his Bruin debut in place of the injured Hampus Lindholm (day-to-day, lower body), moved down from his left point position to gather an Andrew Peeke shot that was off the mark and rimmed around to Harris\u2019 side. From the bottom of left circle, Harris made put it on a tee for Pavel Zacha, who ripped home a one-timer from the middle of the left circle for his first of circle.<\/p>\n
If not for Buffalo goalie Alex Lyon, the B\u2019s could have have up by two or three goals. They had a couple of active power plays on which Lyon shut the door. David Pastrnak fired the puck eight times and landed it on net five times in the first period.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, there was an undercurrent of malevolence coming from the Sabres\u2019 Mason Geertsen (6-foot-5, 231 pounds), who got into a couple of jawing matches with 6-foot-7, 255-pound Nikita Zadorov, but nothing came of it.<\/p>\n
Thanks to a couple of Bruin penalties in the first 5:38 of the second period, the Sabres made the shot clock look a little more respectable. Their best chance actually came on a delayed call on Fraser Minten when Jeremy Swayman made a terrific stop on a backdoor shot from Peyton Krebs.<\/p>\n
The B\u2019s had a couple of really good chances on the two kills, the first one a 2-on-1 with Minten feeding Tanner Jeannot but Jeannot missed the net. The second one came off a Kastelic steal and partial break-in that drew a slashing penalty on Owen Power.<\/p>\n
The ensuing power play was unsuccessful \u2013 Lyon robbed Lindholm on the best chance \u2013 but the hockey gods rewarded Kastelic for his hustle at 10:21. After the fourth line applied some good pressure, Kastelic retrieved a loose puck out high by the right point and he just flung it toward the net. It hit Sabre defenseman Connor Timmins in front and trickled through Lyon for Kastelic\u2019s first of the year and a 2-0 advantage.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe message right now is to fire a million pucks,\u201d said Kastelic.<\/p>\n
But the B\u2019s let the Sabres hang around and the visitors cut the lead in half at 9:46 of the third period on a rough shift from Andrew Peeke. Peeke\u2019s pass up the middle from his own zone got knocked down in the neutral zone. The Sabres counter-attacked and scored on a deflected shot of their own as Jason Zucker\u2019s shot went off Peeke\u2019s stick blade and into the top shelf over Swayman\u2019s blocker.<\/p>\n
The B\u2019s had no room for error after that. They had to kill off a Charlie McAvoy penalty midway through the period, which they did to improve to 12-for-12 on the kill for the year.<\/p>\n
They had several chances to score the empty netter but it didn\u2019t come until the very end.<\/p>\n
Originally Published: October 11, 2025 at 9:43 PM EDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of these days, the Bruins\u2019 struggle to score goals will cost them. But the Buffalo Sabres, forever…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":239391,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5100],"tags":[530,1107,229,5133,5,156,6296,4,7610,1108,2125],"class_list":{"0":"post-239390","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-buffalo-sabres","8":"tag-bruins","9":"tag-buffalo","10":"tag-buffalo-sabres","11":"tag-buffalosabres","12":"tag-hockey","13":"tag-jeremy-swayman","14":"tag-mark-kastelic","15":"tag-nhl","16":"tag-pavel-zacha","17":"tag-sabres","18":"tag-uncategorized"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115360310497839093","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239390"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239390\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/239391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}