The Sabres and Red Wings played an exciting game on Saturday afternoon, but once again, the Sabres fell just short. Detroit’s late goal from Tomas Tatar was the difference as they beat Buffalo, 4-3, at the First Niagara Center.
This was a game in which the Sabres battled back. Jack Eichel showed up and scored two goals in 3:01 to tie things up. The pair of goals tied him with Dylan Larkin for the rookie lead with 13 goals.
Detroit scored again, but then Sam Reinhart was there to tie it up. Nice to see that this team doesn’t give up, but they’re so young that they have trouble finishing teams off.
Tatar’s goal was devastating with just a couple of minutes remaining.
“It’s tough not to get frustrated,” Reinhart said. “I mean, it’s a long year and you’re going to go through spurts like that where things aren’t quite going your way. The chances have been there, so it’s been made a little bit easier to stick with it. Hopefully that opens things up for me.”
Zach Bogosian had a golden opportunity to tie the game at four after Eichel set him up with a breakaway. Unfortunately, it couldn’t have been a forward instead. Bogosian shot the puck right into Petr Mrazek’s chest. That was it for the Sabres.
“He’s got an ability to seize the moment,” Detroit head coach Jeff Blashill said. “That’s one thing he’s done real good. Petr’s done that throughout his career. You don’t want to give up the breakaway obviously there at the end to Bogosian, but he made the big save on it. We’ve still got areas to get better, but I was happy certainly with the way he played.”
They had their chances, but never held the lead in this one.
This was another game that showed the Sabres can compete and stick with teams, but they can’t win. Scoring is one of the bigger issues, but still, this team is much better than last year’s.
Things aren’t going to get easier because the Florida Panthers are the next opponent, and they’ve rattled off nine consecutive wins.