The Buffalo Sabres coach has named five players, including a highly regarded star, to be traded.
After winning in overtime on Thursday, the Flyers and Sabres take against Philadelphia.
After having comparable beginnings to the season, the Philadelphia Flyers and Buffalo Sabres will play each other in Philadelphia for the first game this year.
The Sabres began the season 1-4-1, while the Flyers began 1-5-1. However, they have both recovered and are currently playing the finest hockey of the year. Buffalo is 4-1-0 in its past five games, while Philadelphia is 3-0-1 in its last four.
In their most recent matchups, both teams won in overtime thanks to a comeback in the third period.
With less than ten minutes remaining on Thursday, Philadelphia was down the Ottawa Senators 4-2 when goals from Anthony Richard and Bobby Brink forced overtime. After a rough start, Matvei Michkov came through in overtime to help Philadelphia win.
“It’s the National Hockey League at its best,” stated John Tortorella, coaches of the Flyers. “You perform as poorly as we did and yet win. I simply… I don’t know.”
Michkov scored an overtime goal, making him the youngest player in Flyers history to do it. The 19-year-old Russian, who was a healthy scratch in the first two games, has now put up two consecutive clutch performances.
With a goal and two assists from Travis Sanheim, Philadelphia knows it needs to improve in the first game of a five-game homestand on Saturday.
Regarding the victory versus Ottawa, Sanheim remarked, “It’s obviously not our best,” “I believe you’ll accept it and move on if you can salvage two points from a poor hockey performance. We’ll prepare for a homestand in which we must excel. It’s education.
The Flyers won thanks to Ivan Fedotov, but they will probably start Samuel Ersson in goal against a Buffalo squad that comes in with a lot of energy.
Alex Tuch’s equalizer with less than eight minutes remaining Thursday put the Sabres ahead 1-0 over the St. Louis Blues, forcing overtime. The supporters were ecstatic when Rasmus Dahlin scored the game-winning goal.
Despite playing without starting goaltender Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen and leading goal scorer Tage Thompson, Buffalo managed to secure their first overtime victory of the season. Both are regarded as day-to-day due to unexplained ailments and missed the game.
“Good response,” commented Lindy Ruff, coach of Buffalo. “Again, you’ve got to be able to overcome tough moments.”
With Thompson out of the lineup and his 11 goals tied for sixth in the NHL going into Friday, Ruff was especially happy with how Ryan McLeod (one goal, one assist) improved his game.
“I thought he stepped up the way we needed,” Ruff stated. “It was the next man’s opportunity, and he took advantage of it.”
When the Sabres play a club that has been on a similar trajectory in the first few months of the season on Saturday, they will be hoping for more of that.
After defeating St. Louis, Dahlin remarked, “It was not pretty today, but we found a way,” It’s what successful teams do. We played a fairly mature game, in my opinion. Therefore, I’m rather pleased with everyone’s work.”lessons, areas we need to be better at.”
