Buffalo Sabres

What the Quant Says

232 goals, 22nd in the league, off 2.305 expected goals per 60 at even strength, 30th. The chances were among the worst in hockey and the finishing rescued a good deal of it.

At five-on-five it scored 158 against an expectation of 149.8 — eight goals of finishing gained, 9th in the league.

Tage Thompson had 38 goals and 68 points, off 10.88 shots per 60 — the 94th percentile — at a median of 33 feet, the 96th, with only 34 per cent of his attempts from inside the slot, the 3rd. A 6-6 centre who scores from the top of the circle because the puck arrives before the goaltender has moved.

Jeff Skinner had 33 goals and 63 points off 11.49 shots per 60, the 97th percentile, with 56 per cent of them from inside the slot at a median of 21 feet. The two leading scorers on this club shoot from opposite ends of the same ice.

Rasmus Dahlin had 40 assists from the blue line. Victor Olofsson scored 20 from a median of 35 feet with 25 per cent of his attempts in the slot — the 1st percentile among the league's forwards. Kyle Okposo scored 21 at thirty-four. Alex Tuch had 38 points in 50 games after shoulder surgery.

Dylan Cozens had 38 points at twenty-one and Peyton Krebs 22 at twenty, and the two of them are why the forward group is worth watching rather than worth counting.

What the Scout Says

Thompson is 6-6 and stands at the top of the circle, and the puck arrives before a goaltender has finished moving. The reach means a puck he touches on a wall is difficult to take back, and the 2.11 takeaways per 60 is the part of last season nobody predicted.

Skinner is the opposite and just as effective: close, central, hard and constant, and he wins pucks below the goal line at 5-11. He does not accelerate — 1.3 bursts above 20 mph per 60 — and he scores 33 goals from the slot anyway, because the separation is entirely about where he chooses to stand.

Olofsson never enters the slot. The shot is not hard and it is early, released before a goaltender has set, from a distance where being set is what matters most. It is a real and specific skill and it is also the ceiling.

Tuch is the most complete forward here. Cozens carries rather than chips and cannot finish yet. Krebs has the softest shot on the roster and gave the puck away twice for every one he won. Hinostroza never stops moving his feet. Okposo is the senior man and shoots hard from range.

What the Quant Says

290 goals against, 25th, off 2.674 expected goals against per 60 at even strength, 22nd in the league.

At five-on-five it conceded 200 against an expectation of 173.5. Twenty-seven goals worse than the chances — the crease, not the blue line, and the gap is the single largest number on this page.

Rasmus Dahlin played 24:01 a night at twenty-two, the 91st percentile among defencemen, and covered 3.52 miles a game — the 97th percentile among all skaters this book tracks. His chance share was 46.4 per cent and his ice went 57-67 against an expectation of 56.7-65.53, which means the minus-22 is an honest description of the minutes rather than bad luck.

Jacob Bryson, at 5-9 and 177, took 48.4 per cent across 1,199 minutes with 3.9 bursts above 20 mph per 60 — the 94th percentile at the position. Henri Jokiharju played 21:53 and blocked 2.74 shots per 60, the 7th percentile. Mattias Samuelsson, 6-4 and 229, hit at the 86th percentile in 42 games and has been signed for seven years.

Ilya Lyubushkin arrives with 8.35 hits per 60, the 90th percentile, and a 100.4 mph shot he takes 2.41 times per 60 — the 2nd percentile. Owen Power arrives having played eight NHL games.

What the Scout Says

Dahlin leaves his own zone with the puck rather than passing it away, and that has been visible since he was eighteen. What has not arrived is the defending: he is not in front of shots, he does not finish checks, and he fouls when the gap goes.

Samuelsson is the counterweight — 6-4 and 229, and nothing gets to the front of his net without paying for it — and he draws penalties at the 89th percentile without taking them, which is the rare version of a heavy defenceman.

Bryson is 5-9 and everything he does defensively has to happen before the puck arrives. The feet are genuinely quick and the offensive half of the small-defenceman bargain has not appeared: ten points in 73 games.

Jokiharju moves it and does not drive it. Lyubushkin finishes every check available and a few that are not, and cannot skate with a winger going wide. Fitzgerald is a seventh defenceman with 20.9 mph feet. Clague is on his fourth organisation at twenty-four.

What the Quant Says

Buffalo's goaltending came in 26.5 goals worse than the chances it faced, 28th in the league — and six goaltenders were used to produce that figure.

Craig Anderson went 17-12-2 with an .8974 and a 3.12 in 31 games at forty, facing 945 shots. His career line across 683 games is a .9121 with 42 shutouts and 308 wins.

Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen went 2-5-2 with a .9170 in 9 games at twenty-three, facing 277 shots — the best figure anybody in this crease produced, on nine games.

Dustin Tokarski played 29 games and has gone to Pittsburgh. Aaron Dell played 12 and has gone to San Jose. Malcolm Subban played 4 and Michael Houser 2, and neither remains.

Eric Comrie arrives from Winnipeg with a .9200 in 19 games and a career .9049 across 28. Winnipeg's goaltending finished 10.5 goals ahead of its chances, 8th in the league, so a backup behind Connor Hellebuyck is a comfortable place to have posted it.

A forty-one-year-old, a twenty-three-year-old with 13 NHL games and a twenty-seven-year-old with 28. Buffalo has decided this is a competition. The 26.5 says it is a problem.

What the Scout Says

Anderson is a reactive, athletic goaltender rather than a positional one, which is a style that ages badly and has aged better here than anybody expected. He is 41 and was signed to be the adult in a room of twenty-two-year-olds.

Comrie is compact and positional, plays his depth honestly and does not gamble. There is not much scrambling and not much reach, and 28 NHL games in nine professional seasons is the whole record.

Luukkonen is 6-5 and covers the lower half of the net standing up, and the questions have always been about the recovery when he has to move. Hip surgery at twenty cost him a year and thirteen NHL games is all there is to go on.

Nobody outside the organisation knows which of the three is the answer, and there is a real possibility that none of them is.

What the Quant Says

29th in the league at 5.273 expected goals per 60, over 4:29 a night.

Tage Thompson scored 10 power-play goals, Kyle Okposo 8, Victor Olofsson 7, Jeff Skinner 5, Rasmus Dahlin 3 and Zemgus Girgensons 3, with Dylan Cozens, Rasmus Asplund and Alex Tuch 2 apiece and Casey Mittelstadt and Jacob Bryson one each.

Dahlin took 3:05 a night of it, the 94th percentile among defencemen, with 40 per cent of his points scored on it, the 91st. Thompson took 2:38, Skinner 2:49 and Olofsson 2:14.

Two one-timers and a point shot. Olofsson's from the left circle has been his living since he arrived; Thompson's is the hardest shot in hockey; Dahlin's comes from a median of 54 feet. What is missing is the man in front: Skinner is the only forward on the unit who shoots from inside 25 feet.

Peyton Krebs took 45 per cent of his points on the power play, the 98th percentile, which is a way of saying he produced almost nothing at five-on-five.

What the Scout Says

Two one-timers from opposite circles and a point shot from 54 feet.

Thompson's is the hardest in hockey and Olofsson's is the earliest. Dahlin runs it from the blue line and takes 40 per cent of his points there. Okposo shoots hard from range on the second unit.

The gap is obvious from the shot charts: Skinner is the only forward on this power play who shoots from inside 25 feet, and he is 5-11. Nobody stands in front, so there are no rebounds, and 30th in the league at creating chances with the extra man is what that produces.

What the Quant Says

25th in the league at 7.062 expected goals against per 60, over 4:23 a night — the fewest shorthanded minutes of any club in the bottom third. Buffalo did not take many penalties. It could not kill the ones it took.

Riley Sheahan arrives having killed 2:07 a night, the 94th percentile among forwards, with 2 penalty minutes in 69 games and a penalty differential at the 95th. He is the single most sensible signing on this roster for the unit.

Mattias Samuelsson killed 2:18 a night, Henri Jokiharju 2:03 and Ilya Lyubushkin 1:53. Zemgus Girgensons, Alex Tuch and Kyle Okposo split the forward work.

Alex Tuch blocked 3.19 shots per 60 — the 95th percentile among forwards — and took 2.61 pucks away per 60, the 96th. For a top-six winger, both are close to unheard of, and he is the best penalty killer on the roster by a distance.

Lyubushkin takes 1.07 penalties per 60, the 87th percentile, and finished minus-0.58 on drawn against taken. A club that wants to be shorthanded less has just signed the defenceman most likely to put it there.

What the Scout Says

Sheahan is the arrival that matters — a fourth-line centre who kills two minutes a night, takes two penalty minutes a season and drove play on a last-place club.

Tuch is the best killer here and is a top-six winger, which is a luxury Buffalo cannot really afford and will use anyway: he blocks at the 95th percentile among forwards and strips pucks at the 96th.

Samuelsson and Jokiharju are the defence pair. Samuelsson is willing and enormous; Jokiharju blocks at the 7th percentile, which on a kill is a real absence.

Lyubushkin hits and fouls, and the fouling is the reason the unit will keep being asked to work.