Game 56: Montreal Canadiens vs. Buffalo Sabres
Start time: 7:00 PM EST / 4:00 PM PST
In Canada: Sportsnet (English)
In the Canadiens region: RDS (French)
In the Sabres region: MSG Buffalo
Streaming: ESPN+, RDS, Sportsnet+
The Buffalo Sabres and Montreal Canadiens are found in the same place in the NHL standings, holding 52 points through 55 games played. The Canadiens have two fewer wins, but also two fewer regulation losses as more of their games have gone to overtime. It’s not a place either team wanted to be, coming into the season with post-season aspirations.
Despite both sitting 12 points back of the Eastern Conference’s second wild-card spot, the two clubs have very different profiles. The Canadiens have had great trouble figuring out their game at both ends of the ice this season and rank 27th and 28th in offence and defence, respectively, to explain their position at 26th in the league standings. The Sabres, however, are slightly better at scoring goals, and significantly better at preventing them. Ranking 14th in the league with just 3.07 goals given up per game, that aspect of their play was strong enough to keep them in playoff contention.
One of Buffalo’s biggest issues has been its inability to not just win, but earn points from one-goal games. The Sabres have won six of the 18 they’ve been involved in and only four of the 12 losses made it to overtime, for a points percentage of .444. Montreal, meanwhile, has won 15 of 31 such games, with a record 15-8-8 for a mark of .613.
| Canadiens | Statistics | Sabres |
|---|---|---|
| 22-25-8 | Record | 24-27-4 |
| 44.6% (29th) | Scoring-chances-for % | 50.2% (19th) |
| 2.78 (27th) | Goals per game | 2.93 (21st) |
| 3.53 (28th) | Goals against per game | 3.07 (14th) |
| 20.1% (18th) | PP% | 14.6% (27th) |
| 74.0% (31st) | PK% | 79.8% (14th) |
| 2-1-0 | Head-to-Head Record | 1-1-1 |
Both teams are guilty of playing a goaltender who did more harm than good in his starts. In Montreal, Jake Allen has been the tank commander with 11 regulation losses in 19 starts. The Sabres were quicker to pull the plug on Eric Comrie’s tenure after just eight starts, but that proved to be seven too many as he won just a single game. A simple .500 record for him would have earned the team another six points at this stage, giving them at least a fighting chance for a playoff spot.
But there is at least a silver lining for Sabres fans with their goaltending situation. As Montreal has with Samuel Montembeault emerging as a number-one option, Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen has been solid for the Sabres all season long. The 24-year-old has a .910 save percentage in 28 starts and ranks fourth in the NHL with four shutouts. Most of the hockey world thought it would be Devon Levi who look over in the Buffalo crease for the foreseeable future, but it may be the OHL’s Most Outstanding Player from 2019 who slides into that role instead. He has a long way to go to secure that role for himself, but, at the very least, a debate about which of two young goaltenders is the top option is a healthy one for an organization that has struggled to find a true starter since Ryan Miller left.
Perhaps the most shocking change from 2022-23 to this year for the Sabres is the utter collapse of their power play. It rose from 21.0% three season ago to 21.2%, to 23.4% in 2022-23 when it ranked ninth. This year it’s at 14.6%, 27th in the NHL.
The top 11 power-play point-producers from a season ago are still the top 11 scorers on the man advantage. Health has been a bit more of a concern this season after it was barely an issue a year ago, but even then the top eight players have played at least 45 of the 55 games; The pieces are in place; the execution simply hasn’t been there, and that has cost the Sabres points.
We’d all prefer not to think about what the Canadiens would look like if their own man advantage had remained at such a low efficiency this season. The rapid, intentional movement on the power play has been one of the most entertaining aspects of the club over the past couple of months and has turned the league’s attention back to Juraj Slafkovský after most outside observers had written him off. He enters this game on an eight-game point streak, during which he has recorded 12 points, half of them on the man advantage. He didn’t have any points in the previous three matches between the Canadiens and Sabres this season, so this is a chance to show another group how much his game has improved since even January 4 when the clubs last faced one another.