The Buffalo Sabres enter the 2025-26 season looking to end a 14-season playoff drought and will begin that quest Thursday night against the visiting New York Rangers.
New York began the season with a 3-0 loss to the visiting Pittsburgh Penguins on Tuesday to spoil the debut of head coach Mike Sullivan, who was facing his former club. Sullivan joined the Rangers after 10 seasons and two Stanley Cup titles with the Penguins.
Head coach Lindy Ruff returns for his second season in Buffalo after the Sabres finished a distant 12 points behind the Montreal Canadiens for the final wild-card spot in the Eastern conference last season.
In the offseason, Buffalo sent 23-year-old forward JJ Peterka to the Utah Mammoth for defenseman Michael Kesselring and forward Josh Doan. They also signed free-agent forward Justin Danforth, formerly of the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Doan, 23, had seven goals and 12 assists in 51 games for Utah last season.
“He’s a guy that doesn’t take any time off in practice,” Ruff said. “Really feels that whatever drill he’s doing, that drill is going to make him better. He works at it, whether we’re doing line rush coverage or D zone. You can see he’s locked in.”
Ruff ruled out Kesselring (undisclosed) and goaltender Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen (lower body) for opening night. Defenseman Mattias Samuelsson has returned to practice and could play opening night. Defenseman Owen Power (undisclosed) practiced in a non-contact jersey and also could play against the Rangers.
Alex Lyon, who was signed in the offseason, and Colten Ellis, who was claimed off waivers from the St. Louis Blues on Monday, will handle the goaltending in Luukkonen’s absence.
“We’re going to deal with a goaltender being out, so I think we’re going to hit a little adversity,” Ruff said. “You develop who you’re going to be. You just can’t start camp and say, ‘We’re going to be this.’ So, we’ve got a chance to prove what we can be by dealing with a little adversity right off the start.”
The Rangers are facing adversity as well and go into their second game looking for their first goal. Igor Shesterkin made 27 saves for the Rangers in Tuesday’s season opener.
The Rangers were shut out in their opener for the first time since the 2020-21 season. Two Penguins goals went into an empty net.
“I think my first observation is we got a long way to go to become the team we want to become,” Sullivan said. “I thought we had moments in the game where we were playing the game that we envision that we can play more consistently, but it’s not nearly consistent enough.”
The Rangers were outshot 30-25 and went 0-for-2 on the power play.
Mika Zibanejad had New York’s best scoring chance, getting open in front on a feed by Will Cuylle in the first period, but his shot was wide.
“They outplayed us for majority of the game. We had some good moments in the third, but I think where we’re trying to get to is better than what we showed today,” Rangers captain J.T. Miller said. “On the other side of that is it’s the first game. I know we are going to be better.”
–Field Level Media
