What we have here is a tale of two homes. While the perpetually rebuilding Sabres are trying to forge one, Jack Eichel is finally going to get a chance to play in his new one.
And who says both teams can't love that whopper of a trade we saw in November? The Vegas Golden Knights think Eichel is the missing piece to their Stanley Cup dreams. And, as we learned three years ago with Ryan O'Reilly in St. Louis, they might be bang-on.
Olofsson scored his first goal since Halloween, giving Buffalo a 4-3 edge with 2:55 remaining in regulation en route to a 6-3 win over the New York Islanders.
The Sabres, however, don't have to take a back seat on this deal. Alex Tuch has had more immediate impact on this club than any in-season acquisition in more than 20 years, Peyton Krebs continues to show absolutely sick hands and passing ability and there's still two draft picks to come.
The Sabres defeated the New York Islanders 6-3 on Tuesday. An actual two-game winning streak for the first time since December and huge contributions (again) from Tuch and Krebs. Wednesday night, attention swings to the Vegas Strip, as former Buffalo captain Eichel makes his long-awaited debut for the Golden Knights against the Colorado Avalanche in a game on TNT.
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The atmosphere in Vegas is sensational most nights. This one will be super-charged even more than usual, probably the best at T-Mobile Arena for a regular-season game since the emotional franchise opener in 2017 less than two weeks after the horrific mass shooting down the street outside the Mandalay Bay resort.
Cozens is close to producing at a 20-goal pace, totaling 11 goals and 21 points in 44 games. He’s averaging 15:55 of ice time and ranks fourth on the team with 83 shots on goal.
The atmosphere in Buffalo, of course, is about as far from sensational as it can get. The Sabres announced a crowd of 9,296 Tuesday night, above their season average, but still a half-full building. They started the year here 5-1-1. They entered Tuesday 2-11-3 since. Not the way to draw people in.
This is the kind of performance that can do it. There were 41 shots on goal. Six goals. Multi-point games from four players. A short-handed goal from Tage Thompson, a second-period buzzer beater from Tuch. Victor Olofsson's two goals in the final three minutes – after he had not a single one the last three months. Incredible work by Krebs, including the pass to set up Tuch's goal and a sick cross-icer for Olofsson's game-winner.
"It's huge. We start winning at home more, I think more fans will show up," Tuch said. "We get more momentum, we get more energy. That will make it a lot more fun on everybody I think.
"You know what? Fun is winning and winning is fun."
Put that quote on a T-shirt and put the 'C' on the pride of Syracuse come training camp in September. As brutal as trading Eichel was, it sure feels better if you got your future captain in return.
Almost 11 months since his final game with the Buffalo Sabres, Eichel will finally debut with the Golden Knights on Wednesday night against the Colorado Avalanche in Las Vegas' T-Mobile Arena.
Under owner Bill Foley, the Golden Knights have been all in since Day One and have built a franchise on and off the ice that is the envy of the NHL in so many respects. They made the Stanley Cup final in 2018 and could have made it any of the last three years, as well. They have really needed a No. 1 center. Eichel fits that bill – but he's never played a playoff game. That will change come May.
"He's just made it clear that, obviously, expectation here and Vegas and with this organization is to win the Stanley Cup," Eichel said of Foley during a video call Monday in Vegas. "I think that should be every team's expectation, and it's great that the organization feels that way and everything that we do throughout the season is geared towards winning."
Save for those two little years where the Pegulas give Tim Murray permission to "lose properly," the Sabres say they want to win, but have mostly shown they've had no idea how to do it.
Things bottomed out in the standings in 2018 and 2021 and aren't a whole lot better this year, but you can see the building blocks for a quick climb, even as we all await Owen Power's expected arrival on the scene sometime in April.
Coach Don Granato knew his team has been better on the road, but cited the injury/Covid-19 situations as huge factors in the home struggles. Of course, they exist on the road, as well. The Sabres were letting this one get away, too, but grabbed it in the last 10 minutes. About time.
Jokiharju doesn’t make jaw-dropping plays, aside from pinpoint breakout passes that can be overlooked by the casual observer, but he’s a stable presence on the blue line and unquestionably one of the Sabres’ top trade acquisitions in recent years.
"We gave up the lead ... and our guys elevated their compete, elevated their intensity and desire to win and that was phenomenal to see," Granato said. "That was exactly what we needed."
Earlier in the day, alternate captain Kyle Okposo was musing about the Sabres trying to become a "mature team" and how the lack of crowd didn't impact them earlier in the season. Wins like the victory over the Islanders show growth on all fronts.
Okposo is perhaps Eichel's closest remaining friend on the Buffalo roster. When the Sabres were in Vegas two weeks ago, Okposo was seen after the game joining Granato in the dressing room hallway for a chat with his former captain. The bet here is he'll give a check to the TV for a bit late Wednesday.
"Happy for him. Obviously a good friend of mine and talked to him in Vegas," Okposo said. "I knew kind of that was the plan and glad to see that he's progressing well and is able to play. The league is better when its stars are in it, and he's definitely one of them, one of the most talented players in the world. I'm just happy that he's going to get back and play hockey again."
