After playing their best game of the young season, the Buffalo Sabres aim to keep the momentum going when they kick off a three-game road trip with a visit to the Montreal Canadiens on Tuesday.
The Sabres showed off the speed, pace and skill that helped them tear through the NHL from early December of last season in a 5-3 win against the Florida Panthers on Monday. They held three one-goal leads before scoring twice in the third to secure the victory.
“I thought it was our best start,” Buffalo coach Lindy Ruff said. “Moved the puck well. We got pucks to the net. We got there for second opportunities. I think the shots were seven or eight to one after seven or eight minutes. We got to loose pucks, but I thought we skated well, moved to puck well. In the six games so far, that was probably our best hockey game.”
The Sabres pulled out the win without their captain, Rasmus Dahlin. The defenseman, who put Buffalo ahead 2-1 with a power-play goal late in the first period, left the game early in the second with an upper-body injury.
He did not travel with the team to Montreal. Ruff said he’s day to day.
Buffalo had lost two straight before Monday’s triumph, scoring only once. That lone goal was their first power-play tally of the season, coming in Saturday’s 4-1 setback to the Utah Mammoth. The team had been 0-for-13 with the man advantage prior to that goal.
The Sabres added two more on the power play against Florida on five opportunities.
“It’s really nice to see that kind of kind of turn for us,” Doan said. “I think that’s something that I think there’s a lot of expectations right out of the gates this year, our power play was going to be snapping it around, and sometimes it takes a little bit to kind of feel it out and feel out the new things.”
Montreal enters Tuesday’s contest looking for a second straight win after snapping a three-game skid with a 1-0 shootout triumph against the Detroit Red Wings on Saturday.
Zachary Bolduc scored the deciding goal in the shootout. The 23-year-old, who had 12 non-shootout goals in his first season with Montreal last year, has three goals through the first five games.
“I think I’m finding my identity,” he said. “I think I’m playing well with (linemates Phillip Danault and Alexandre Texier). We’ve got a good chemistry and that helps sometimes cover for a bad play or a bad night. It’s good for everyone.”
Goalie Jacob Fowler has started each of the Canadiens’ past two games, allowing three total goals. Jakub Dobes got the nod in the first three games of the season to middling results. He was victorious in their season opener against the Toronto Maple Leafs, giving up just two goals on 28 shots, but allowed 11 goals over the next two games in losses to the Pittsburgh Penguins and Carolina Hurricanes.
Fowler was recalled from Laval of the American Hockey League on Oct. 7 after Samuel Montembeault was injured during practice.
“I want them to have enough confidence in me to play me regularly,” said the 21-year-old Fowler.
