Michael Houser was one of three goalies at the Buffalo Sabres' practice Friday in LECOM HarborCenter, but he left the ice early. The team has been shuffling goalies to get them enough work in practice and Houser was expected to play one and perhaps both games this weekend as part of the team's Western trip, so that didn't seem like a big deal.
Coach Don Granato pointed out Thursday the Sabres didn't put suspended goalie Aaron Dell on the ice for practice for exactly that reason. There just aren't enough reps to go around for multiple goalies during a workout of only about an hour.
As it turns out, Houser's departure foreshadowed yet another chapter in the Sabres' daily goaltending dilemma.
The 29-year-old had a positive Covid-19 test and the Sabres had to run a confirmatory test. When that came back positive, the team made the stunning announcement that Houser – the club's lone remaining healthy netminder – has been placed on the NHL's Covid-19 protocol list.
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The news came just prior to the team's departure for Phoenix for its three-game road trip that begins Saturday night against the Arizona Coyotes in Gila River Arena.
The news has to be hugely disappointing for Houser (2-0, 2.00/.948), since he was clearly going to have the net on this road trip in the wake of the three-game suspension Dell earned Tuesday night for his interference on Ottawa's Drake Batherson.
But it leads to yet another crisis for the team as a whole. Do the Sabres have any goalies at all for this trip? The team is white-knuckling it and is hopeful it has solutions.
Craig Anderson and Dustin Tokarski worked fully in practice Friday. Prior to the workout, general manager Kevyn Adams told that reporters Anderson – out since Nov. 2 with a neck injury – had progressed enough to dress on the trip.
"Backing up and playing to me is the same," Adams said. "You have to be ready."
This was before news of Houser's test. The Sabres may have no choice now. Anderson was encouraged when he spoke to reporters on Thursday, but said he was still on a day-to-day recovery plan and it wouldn't be good for the team or himself to go on the ice if he wasn't ready.
Tokarski, meanwhile, worked out for nearly 45 minutes after practice and is going on the trip. But he has been on the Covid-19 list since Dec. 2 and the team has said he has been dealing with "Covid fog" issues.
Could he play?
"I think it's possible. But I don't know," Tokarski said. "It's a day to day thing. As everyone's been telling you, I wish we could give you more. But that's actually the honest truth with it. Because some days you feel something, some days you don't and we're working together with the doctors and coaches and staff to make up a plan that is good for everyone, good for the team, good for myself health-wise."
Granato spoke in hopeful tones after practice on both players, particularly because they tended the nets during the club's short-rink 3-on-3 games that can get pretty intense and physical.
"The medical team will clear them to go when they feel that they're comfortable with what they've gone through from the component of injury and recovery," Granato said. "And that's what this is all about: Ramping it up. Because they haven't participated in much practice with the shots and the traffic and the physicality ... and they need that. They need that for their own peace of mind to say that, 'OK, I can handle a game right now'. And they just hadn't had much of that."
The Sabres have been without Anderson, Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen (lower body) and Malcolm Subban (arm surgery) due to injury, Tokarski due to illness and are now without Dell due to his ill-timed suspension.
The suspension meant the team needed Anderson or Tokarski to be ready for the road trip. Now, it appears the club will need both of them.
Otherwise, the team will either have to sign Rochester's Mat Robson to an NHL contract or find a goalie elsewhere. And the Amerks need Robson for their home games Friday and Saturday against Syracuse and Utica, respectively. Their backup is former Canisius College netminder Charles Williams, recently signed to a tryout contract out of the ECHL.
Girgensons also out
Granato said the team would be without Zemgus Girgensons on the road trip, as he aggravated a lower-body injury Tuesday in Ottawa and needs time to heal. Girgensons had sat out the previous four games.
"We feel confident that should resolve it," Granato said. "But we're having doctors look at him further again, to make certain that this is something that just will resolve within the next few days."
Without Girgensons, one of their top penalty-killers, the team gave up six power-play goals in a three-game stretch last week.
