The NHL will announce its team captains and the rosters for the All-Star Game on Thursday night during ESPN's 6 p.m. airing of "SportsCenter," and it could be a coming-out party for Buffalo Sabres defenseman Rasmus Dahlin.
The former No. 1 overall pick looks to be the best candidate for the Atlantic Division team on the Buffalo roster for the skills competition Feb. 4 and the game in Las Vegas on Feb. 5. He has six goals and 16 assists, on pace for a career-high 51 points, and could become the first Buffalo defenseman with a 15-goal season since Alexei Zhitnik in 1997-98.
General Manager Kevyn Adams said Subban's injury is the more severe of the two and the Sabres are officially listing him out as month to month. Luukkonen is listed as week to week.
After plenty of tough times in November, Dahlin has also picked up his defensive game and is posting monster ice times. He has surpassed 25 minutes seven times in the last 11 games, and has played more than 27 minutes three times.
"This is my first year playing against the other teams' top lines, and I really feel like I've taken the next step and been able to play defensively against the best players in the league," Dahlin said Wednesday. "Everything starts with the defense, you're playing good D, you get good confidence."
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Dahlin said he hasn't given much thought to playing in the All-Star Game, but knows his defensive work this season would have him ready for the 3-on-3 format against elite players from other divisions.
When you sit through annihilations like Tuesday's 6-1 drubbing at the hands of the Stanley Cup champion Bolts, a Sabres' turnaround still feels a long, long way away, says Harrington.
"It's a battle. It's challenging, for sure. It's fun," he said of those matchups. "You can't make a mistake, because they'll score. You have to focus in for 60 minutes, and you have to really dig in and you have to really be prepared."
Coach Don Granato has been effusive in his praise of Dahlin in recent games, and has adopted him as his runaway No. 1 defenseman.
"Everybody's talked about how prolific he is, and he is a prolific talent," Granato said. "But he hasn't been to that level, yet. And so, if he gets a chance to do that, that's much like the player from the American league getting called up for his first time. It's a whole other level, a world of confidence can come from that type of experience.
"There's very few guys that both kill plays and transition plays in the league. And that's why he's an elite defenseman. And he's just going to get better at both. He is getting better at both as we watch and he's starting to identify with how to become better with what his skill sets are."
Why not keep Quinn?
Quinn, the 20-year-old who was the Sabres' No. 1 pick in the 2020 draft, was a 52-goal scorer for the Ottawa 67s in his final year of junior hockey. After two goals in 15 games at Rochester in the pandemic-shortened 2021 season, Quinn tore up the AHL this year.
The Sabres returned Jack Quinn and Casey Fitzgerald to Rochester so they could play in the Amerks' game Wednesday night against AHL-leading Utica in Blue Cross Arena. Quinn had a team-high three shots on goal Tuesday against Tampa Bay and was one of the Sabres' better all-around players in the game. Why not reward the No. 1 pick from 2020 with more NHL time by taking him on the road trip to Nashville and Detroit?
"We had talked about it with him prior and just said it's part reward because he's playing well," Granato said. "It's an opportunity, there's a window of opportunity here. We communicated to him to do it. We had a great conversation with him this morning and he talked about how, 'It was interesting to see how little time and space I have.'
"He had two great scoring chances and he said, 'In the American league, I would have scored those.' The defender (in the NHL) was a little smarter, a little quicker and a little more skilled. Players have to calibrate the next level. So you gave them a taste of it."
Granato added that Quinn's strong showing didn't change the Sabres' thinking because of the expected return of Alex Tuch and Kyle Okposo from Covid-19 protocol. The Sabres want to see Quinn keep playing in games, but, in the wake of his bout with mononucleosis last month, don't want to overexpose him to their coming schedule that features six games in 10 days.
Said Granato: "I think it's best to stick to our plan. ... Game after game right now, we just don't want to throw him in the grind."
Shortly before practice began Monday in KeyBank Center, the team learned center and leading scorer Tage Thompson had a positive test and needed to be added to the list.
Other lineup news
Granato said defenseman Robert Hagg, out for the last seven games with a lower-body injury, will return to the lineup Thursday night in Nashville. Tuch and Okposo, who have missed the last two games, continue to practice and are likely to return. Peyton Krebs and Tage Thompson remain in protocol and neither is practicing.
