BUFFALO, N.Y. \u2014 In the second period of the Buffalo Sabres\u2019 5-3 win against the Anaheim Ducks Saturday, Josh Doan showed what makes him such a valuable player.<\/p>\n
The Ducks, trailing 1-0, looked like they were about to break the puck out of their defensive zone. Doan closed on Tim Washe, who was carrying the puck, lifted his stick and knocked the puck loose. Peyton Krebs snagged it and fed a perfect pass through the legs of Ducks defenseman Radko Gudas to give Tage Thompson an easy tap-in goal.<\/p>\n
So much had to go right for a goal like that to happen, but it wouldn\u2019t have been possible without Doan\u2019s awareness, hustle and strength to get the takeaway. Doan came into the game leading the NHL in takeaways. Some go unnoticed, but that one had a clear impact.<\/p>\n
\u201cPure effort,\u201d Sabres coach Lindy Ruff said. \u201cJust on the puck, relentless to take it away. Just an awesome job to get it and got rewarded by the other two guys putting it in the back of the net. But the play doesn\u2019t happen if he doesn\u2019t come up with the effort he came up with. That\u2019s just determination. That\u2019s not quitting on a play. That\u2019s tracking back, getting under his stick. It was just a great play. There\u2019s nothing too much more you can say about it. Just effort alone is A-plus.\u201d<\/p>\n
That type of play has become commonplace for Doan. He has 30 points through 43 games, but he brings so much more to Buffalo\u2019s lineup than just scoring. Among forwards with at least 500 five-on-five minutes, Doan\u2019s 58-percent on-ice expected goal share is eighth in the NHL, according to Natural Stat Trick.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt like you could really see it coming,\u201d said Sabres defenseman Michael Kesselring, who played with Doan in Utah. \u201cHe just didn\u2019t get the right opportunity. I don\u2019t want to blame anybody. But here, he stepped in and got that opportunity and I feel like he\u2019s gotten better and better and better. He\u2019s hard not to like. He plays hard. He plays the same way every night. He\u2019s annoying to play against. He\u2019s all over you. He lifts your stick. He steals the puck. I know he\u2019s been first in takeaways for a while. That\u2019s an underrated stat.\u201d<\/p>\n
Later on, Doan showed another side to his game. After Ryan Strome slashed him behind the play, Doan immediately grabbed him and was ready to fight, which he won handily, firing up the sold-out home crowd.<\/p>\n
Things would get a little dicey for the Sabres. Their 4-1 lead shrank to 4-3 in the final minutes, a stressful late-game situation brought on by careless mistakes.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s on us,\u201d Ruff said. \u201cWe weren\u2019t good enough. We let our goalie down. That is not up to par for our club. Our club can\u2019t accept that. We\u2019re a better club than that. We played well to that point. What we did in that last five minutes isn\u2019t good enough.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Sabres hung on thanks to an empty net goal from Josh Norris, giving them 13 wins in their last 14 games and putting them in the first wild-card position in the Eastern Conference. Their .605 points percentage is tied for ninth best in the league. This week\u2019s schedule includes home games against the Florida Panthers, Philadelphia Flyers and Montreal Canadiens, three other teams battling for playoff position.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is what we\u2019ve been waiting for,\u201d Doan said. \u201cWe\u2019ve been following the standings and it seems whenever East Coast teams play each other, it ends up in overtime or a shootout. It\u2019s hard to gain points and gain a little bit of separation from teams, but it\u2019s an opportunity for us and a big one where we need to take advantage of being at home for them and take advantage of the situation we\u2019ve got.\u201d<\/p>\n
1. Jack Quinn had two goals after scoring just one in his previous 19 games. Ruff has been adamant that Quinn has been generating enough chances to warrant the patience the coaching staff has shown in him.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt goes a long way, his confidence in me,\u201d Quinn said. \u201cYou don\u2019t feel the pressure as much. He believes in me, so it\u2019s nice to be able to just go out there and play my game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Quinn\u2019s first goal came early when Ryan McLeod set him up on a two-on-one. Later, Quinn put the Sabres up 4-1 with what would end up being the game-winner when he stopped and cut toward the middle of the ice as the back-checkers passed him by and then launched a shot into the top corner.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe can make a big difference, for sure,\u201d Ruff said. \u201cYou look at quality opportunities and putting teams away, he\u2019s had a lot of those opportunities to help get us that extra goal. He\u2019s been in good position. But it\u2019s like I said, they\u2019ll go in. Sometimes goal scorers go through a little stretch like that, but it was good. He\u2019s working hard, he\u2019s skating well, he\u2019s in on a good number of chances, so that\u2019s big for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
2. Bowen Byram tied his career high with his 10th goal of the season. He led the team in ice time at 25:56, and the Sabres had an 8-3 advantage in scoring chances during his five-on-five minutes. He was on the ice for four of Buffalo\u2019s five goals and has been a major catalyst for the offense lately. He\u2019s become a workhorse, and Ruff trusts him in every situation. Byram replaced Owen Power on Buffalo\u2019s second power-play unit while leading the team in shorthanded ice time.<\/p>\n
3. This was a rare off night for the pair of Mattias Samuelsson and Rasmus Dahlin. During their five-on-five minutes, the Ducks had a 16-7 advantage in scoring chances. With how much the Sabres have been leaning on the top four defensemen, it\u2019s worth watching for some signs of fatigue with a heavy schedule coming up.<\/p>\n
4. It was the 12th time in 43 games this season in which the Sabres have blocked 20 or more shots in a game. All of last season, the Sabres had 20 or more blocked shots in a game just 10 times. The team\u2019s collective buy-in has been evident on a nightly basis.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the sacrifice this group is willing to make for each other,\u201d Doan said. \u201cA lot of it is because of how close of a group we are and how much fun we have together.\u201d<\/p>\n
5. Kesselring, who aggravated a high-ankle sprain against the Stars on New Year\u2019s Eve, is getting closer to a return. He skated with the team during the morning skate Saturday and said he should be able to play again at some point later in the week. Given the workload of the team\u2019s top four defensemen, Kesselring\u2019s return will be a welcome sight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BUFFALO, N.Y. \u2014 In the second period of the Buffalo Sabres\u2019 5-3 win against the Anaheim Ducks Saturday,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":401999,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[2210,233,5292,229,1739,5,4],"class_list":{"0":"post-401998","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-anaheim-ducks","8":"tag-anaheim","9":"tag-anaheim-ducks","10":"tag-anaheimducks","11":"tag-buffalo-sabres","12":"tag-ducks","13":"tag-hockey","14":"tag-nhl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115877527161119442","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401998","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=401998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/401999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=401998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=401998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=401998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}