BUFFALO — They put an actual wagon with the Buffalo Sabres logo outside the KeyBank Center entrance, along with the words ‘WE’RE BACK’ in huge letters — creating an easy selfie spot for playoff-starved fans on Monday.
Inside, the team brought back the popular beer sabres to keep the Dyngus Day celebration going — some bars in the border city open at 8 a.m. for the Polish-American Easter Monday holiday. Perfect timing, because as the Sabres said, “the drought is over” for what is once again a hockey-mad city (16 straight sellouts and counting).
In the first home game since the team officially ended an NHL-high, 14-season run without a playoff berth, the Sabres also delivered on the ice with a 4-2 win in a much-anticipated rematch against the Tampa Bay Lightning.
“It’s a big thing for us. The building has been rocking for so many games now,” said Sabres goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen. “The fans deserve playoffs, they deserve the best from us every night. It’s great always to get to play here now. It’s so much fun, it’s so much energy we get from it.”
Playing Tampa for the first time since their wild, fight-filled 8-7 win here back on March 8 in what many called the game of the year, the Sabres limited the dangerous Lightning’s chances and pulled even with the Bolts for first place in the Atlantic Division. Buffalo got strong outings from its goalie and local product Alex Tuch in a spotlight game in which the home team never trailed.
After a two-game skid on the road, the Sabres are back on the winning track and now will cheer for the Ottawa Senators to beat the Lightning on Tuesday as Tampa plays its game in hand. The Montreal Canadiens are also very much in this division race, just two points back of the co-leaders. Tampa and Montreal have five games left, while Buffalo has four.
“I think when you look at it, you have to take lot of pride in the fact that you made the playoffs in a year where this division and this conference was so incredibly tough,” Sabres coach Lindy Ruff said. “I think the effort by our group from December on has been sort of second to none to get to where we’re at.”
The Sabres’ third win in four tries this season against the playoff-tested Lightning showed they are capable of making noise when the games mean even more.
Ruff predicted a “tremendous” atmosphere — and he was bang on. One leather-lunged fan in the upper deck bellowed “Hagel sucks” during the anthem, causing some laughs in the aftermath of Brandon Hagel’s attack on captain Rasmus Dahlin last time out. Ruff also noted with a chuckle after the game that he saw clips of fans taking shots at a punching bag with Hagel’s picture on it outside the arena prior to faceoff. All this for a guy who didn’t even play because of injury.
“I think this is going to be one the hardest buildings in the league to play in when we’ve got a crowd like that especially, and we’re playing that well on home ice,” Tuch said. “Home-ice advantage I think is huge in the playoffs, so we’re going to keep trying to push for it.”
Tuch, a lifelong Sabres fan from just down the highway in Syracuse, N.Y., was a huge force. He opened his scoring with his 30th of the season and caused fits all night for Tampa with his skating and hard work, especially on the penalty kill. At one point in the second period, the pending UFA had four legitimate chances to score in two minutes.
“He seemed to have 20 shots on goal himself,” said defenceman Bowen Byram, whose point shot was tipped home by Jason Zucker for the winning goal midway through the second period.
“Skating, moving his feet, tracking hard.”
It would have been nearly impossible for Monday to be as chaotic as the last game between these two teams — but fans still got a healthy portion of entertainment.
There were no fighting majors, but there was plenty of bad blood. All 10 players on the ice were pushing, shoving or doing even more in a skirmish that had the entire crowd standing and screaming midway through the first period.
Most importantly, though, the Sabres buckled down with the 3-2 lead before Jack Quinn sealed it with an empty-netter.
“Every line that went out there didn’t want to get scored on,” Tuch said. “That was a big reason for such a successful game. I thought the commitment was there from all 20 guys and we had (Luukkonen) playing like (Luukkonen) plays, unbelievable.”
Of course, Sabres fans haven’t forgotten the hard times. On Monday morning, local sports-radio station WGR was asking fans to name their worst moments of the drought. Former GM Kevyn Adams’ palm-trees-and-taxes speech just over a year ago was a common answer, along with the Connor McDavid draft-lottery loss in a year where many Buffalo fans regularly made short trips to Erie, Pa., to watch him play in the OHL.
Jack Eichel was a pretty good consolation prize, but we all know how that ended up.
All the pain, of course, just makes this rebound that much sweeter for Sabres supporters. It’s only going to get more exciting in the days and weeks ahead.
“You see the crowd, they’re all in,” Tuch said. “They’ve got our backs, they’re excited and they deserve this.”
Holmberg hurt
Lightning coach Jon Cooper wasn’t happy with one of the off-ice officials after forward Pontus Holmberg was injured after a hit by Peyton Krebs in the third period.
Cooper said the penalty-box door was not completely closed, leading to the injury.
“I don’t know who’s working the penalty box over there, but I don’t know if they should keep their job after what happened there, like leaving the door open,” Cooper said. “That could have hurt anybody on either team. And those are just dangerous situations so a little frustrated on my part to be honest.”
Cooper said Holmberg was “not good.”
Eduardo A. Encina of the Tampa Bay Times reported the league is looking into the matter.
How Kucherov makes opponents ‘look bad’
Lightning star Nikita Kucherov is now tied with McDavid for the league scoring lead with 126 points.
Kucherov had three goals and four assists in the first three games against Buffalo.
“Don’t give him time, don’t give him that extra ice,” Ruff said. “If you give him time, he’s going to make a play. He can make you look bad. His vision and his playmaking ability, I put it right up there as the best in the league.”
The Sabres did give him time on a Lightning power play in the first period. Unsurprisingly, Kucherov one-timed Jake Guentzel’s pass past Luukkonen for his 400th career goal to tie the game at 1-1.
