BUFFALO, N.Y. — Tage Thompson and Jack Quinn sit a few stalls away from each other in the Buffalo Sabres’ dressing room. They talk a lot, and before each game, they repeat a phrase back and forth: five to eight. The idea is if you get between five and eight shots in a game, you’ve got a good chance of putting one in the net.
That didn’t happen for Quinn on Wednesday night. He had a season-high six shots on net but once again was held scoreless in Buffalo’s 1-0 loss to Minnesota. His goal drought is now at 13 games and his only goal the entire season was an empty netter. He’s still trying to beat a goalie for the first time this season. It’s obvious he’s running out of answers.
“I don’t know, I mean, I am frustrated,” Quinn said after the game. “I obviously want to score some goals to help the team but there’s been a stretch this year where I haven’t gotten looks at all. I think it’s a step in the right direction. I know how good I am that if I do get those looks they’ll go in eventually.”
This was the clearest sign yet this season that Quinn is close to breaking through. In the first six games of the season, he had a total of six shots. To match that in one game was promising. Sabres coach Lindy Ruff put Quinn next to a left-handed center in Jiri Kulich and feels like that’s helping him get more looks. Twice in the last three games, he’s had five individual scoring chances, a total he didn’t match in any single game in Buffalo’s first 19 games of the season. The issue was none of his six shots on net came from closer than 23 feet out. His average shot distance in this game was just over 30 feet. The majority of NHL goals are scored within 20 feet of the net.
“I think tonight he was going out there with a mission that he was firing the puck,” Thompson said. “He’s got a great shot and if he gets time and space with it, he can shoot through sticks, through screens. Goal scorers, you get streaky. You get cold, you get hot. For him, he’s struggling a little bit to find it. But once one goes in, they’re going to start coming in waves. Same thing with the team mindset. You can’t change anything. You’re doing the right thing. You’re getting chances. If you’re not getting any chances you have to look yourself in the mirror and say, ‘What am I doing here?’ But he’s getting great looks every night. He just has to stick with it.”
Quinn’s tough-luck night was emblematic of the way the game went for the entire Sabres team. They put 39 shots on net, but Filip Gustavsson stopped every single one, including seven high-danger chances. The Sabres finished with 87 shot attempts, but the Wild blocked 32 shots in this game, and the Sabres had 16 missed shots. Buffalo is fifth in the NHL in missed shots, averaging just over 15 per game.
Some of that is because the Sabres shoot too many low-percentage shots. Their average shot distance in this game was 37 feet. They also need to crash the net for rebounds. According to Money Puck, the Sabres are 23rd in the league in rebound shots for but are tied for the league lead with 11 rebound goals for. When they do get those chances, good things happen.
Ruff has implored his team to get to the net more and create more traffic. That didn’t happen often enough against Gustavsson, who is enjoying a terrific start to the season. In the closing moments of the game, Owen Power and JJ Peterka both missed the net and then each had a shot blocked. Thompson got a prime look in the slot and hit Gustavsson in the chest.
“He was probably just a little rusty with shooting,” Ruff said of Thompson’s first game back after missing five games with a lower-body injury. “You give him that shot in the slot next time, I think he buries it.”
He didn’t on Wednesday, but the Sabres came away thinking if they play that way, they’ll win more often than not. The confidence from the three-game winning streak hasn’t waned. The Sabres have still won seven of their last 10 games and are in the second wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference based on points percentage. They’ll sit down to Thanksgiving dinner knowing they’re in the playoff mix, something that hasn’t happened here in five years. Another test looms Friday with an afternoon home game against the Vancouver Canucks.
“We didn’t get rewarded tonight and that sucks, but that goes back to the maturity thing,” Thompson said. “We can’t, just because we lost one tonight, change the way we play and get discouraged. We play like that we’re going to win a lot of hockey.”
Quick hits
1. Gustavsson was the star of the night, but Sabres goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen was a worthy adversary in the other crease. The only goal Luukkonen allowed was a four-on-one, quick-passing play that ended with a Kirill Kaprizov goal. Luukkonen made a few highlight-reel saves in the third period to keep the game 1-0. He’s now allowed two or fewer goals in seven of his last eight starts. And the only time he didn’t was a game against Montreal in which he played through an injury. The Sabres need to take advantage of the hot streak Luukkonen is on.
2. Quinn’s struggles have gotten plenty of attention, but Peterka has been quiet for a while. He has just one five-on-five goal in his last 15 games. He had nine total shot attempts against the Wild but only put one shot on net. He had a look at an open net at the end of the game, but a Wild player got just enough of the shot to block it and send it into the netting. Playing a top-line role next to Thompson and Alex Tuch, Peterka is getting plenty of opportunity. The Sabres could use more from him.
3. Jiri Kulich got another look at center in this game and ended up with five shots on net and was 52 percent in the faceoff circle. Kulich centered Quinn and Jason Zucker. Ruff put Ryan McLeod on the fourth line between Beck Malenstyn and Sam Lafferty to make room in the lineup for Kulich to play center instead of wing. It’s clear Ruff likes Kulich’s ability to win faceoffs, and he’s creating more looks for Quinn than he was getting when playing with Dylan Cozens.
(Photo: Timothy T. Ludwig / Imagn Images)
