Saturday, July 20, 2013

Welcome to the Atlantic Division, NHL schedule released. Plus RFA signings and Eric Locke

Last season as a member of the five-team Northeast Division the Buffalo Sabres finished 12th in the Eastern Conference, seven points back of the eighth-seeded NY Islanders.

For the 2013-14 season Buffalo will be a part of the newly constructed Atlantic Division featuring the Sabres four foes from the NE--Boston, Montreal, Toronto, and Ottawa--two teams from the former Southeast Division, Tampa Bay and Florida as well as transplanted Western Conference powerhouse Detroit.

Last season all four division opponents made the playoffs.

If you add Detroit to the mix, their 56 points would have been enough to knock the Islanders out of the No. 8 spot.

Heading into the upcoming season, with realignment comes a new playoff format.

The top three teams in each conference are in the playoffs, while the two teams from each conference with the next best records will get in as wild cards.

Looking at last season through the lens of the new playoff format, these would be your playoff teams:
Montreal, Boston and Toronto from freshly minted Atlantic division; Pittsburgh, Washington and the NY Rangers from the new Metropolitan Division.

The two wild card teams would have been Detroit and Ottawa.

Five of the eight teams in Buffalo's division would have made the playoffs and the Sabres would have placed 14th in the conference when you factor in new Eastern Conference addition of Columbus and their 55 points.

For 2013-14, in honor of the new divisions, Buffalo heads to Detroit on October 2nd to kick off the season.

If Sabres fans thought facing division foes Montreal, Boston, Toronto and Ottawa wasn't enough, having to play Detroit four times with Buffalo in rebuild-mode is enough to for them start thinking about tanking for Sam Reinhart or Aaron Ekblad in the 2014 NHL Entry Draft.

Many will look even further down the road and dream of the 2015 Draft and phenom Connor McDavid.

It will be a tough year for one of the youngest teams in the NHL. It will be even tougher if (when?) the Sabres move their two best players, Ryan Miller and Thomas Vanek.

And to complicate things even further, there's a compressed schedule because of the NHL and it's players participating in the Olympics.

Here's a link to a schedule overview from Sabres.com.


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In other news, the Sabres signed two restricted free agents--F Brian Flynn and D Nick Crawford.

Flynn got the call last season when Vanek went down with an injury and never left. He earned himself a two-year deal.

Crawford, a 6th round pick in 2008 has played 199 games for the Sabres in the AHL, signed a one-year contract.


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The 2013 Draft has been in the books for a few weeks now and the general consensus is that the Sabres really nailed it.

It will be years before the final results are tallied but first-rounders Rasmus Ristolainen and Nikita Zadarov look to be a couple of good ones.

Further down the draft, the Sabres had quite a few picks in the bottom rounds including their final pick of the draft, 7th-rounder (#189-overall,) F Eric Locke.

There's always a heightened sense of optimism at the draft as hope reigns supreme, and Bill Hoppe of the Olean Times Herald, runs with it.

Hoppe interviews Locke's former coach Greg Gilbert for an article which embodies optimism and hope while invoking the name of a Hall-of-Fame sniper. The title of the piece:  Coach believes high-scoring Sabres prospect Eric Locke has Brett Hull-like shot.

Neither writer nor coach go as far to say that Locke will approach Hull's 844 goals, but Locke's shot does make for an interesting conversation piece. And seventh-rounders rarely make it to the NHL.

Coach Gilbert, from the Hoppe piece, on Locke and the player his shot reminds him of:
'Brett Hull, to be honest with you. I mean, Hully was special, there’s no question about it. But Eric’s got that potential. He’s got that quick release. He’s low to the ice. He goes through the shot. He scored goals for us this year from just inside the blue line over the goalie’s glove. The goalies didn’t move.'

Kris Baker of sabresprospects.com first brought Locke to our attention when he said, "Locke has speed in open ice and a nice release that sees him pick corners. The Toronto native's 97 points (44+53) [last season] more than doubled the output of his previous two years combined (46+48)."

Baker points out that it was the fifth straight year that the Sabres selected an overager (Locke is 19) with a late round pick and that the players before Locke were big, physical players.

At 5'10" and with elite skills, Locke, according to Baker, fits "the Sabres need for scoring down the wings."

Maybe Locke will be the gift from the hockey gods for the Sabres now being in one of the toughest (maybe toughest) divisions in the NHL.

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