The Buffalo Sabres are back in the NHL playoffs, ending a league-record postseason drought of 14 seasons.
All they had to do was change the messenger.
The Sabres clinched their first playoff berth since 2010-11 with the Detroit Red Wings’ loss in the afternoon on Saturday, April 4.
It was looking like the streak could hit 15 when Buffalo sat in last place in the Eastern Conference on Dec. 8. The Sabres won three in a row to get back to .500, then fired general manager Kevyn Adams on Dec. 15 and promoted Jarmo Kekalainen to the position.
The team took off, extending its winning streak to 10 games. Entering Saturday, Buffalo has gone 32-8-4 under the former Columbus Blue Jackets GM. The Sabres have their first 100-point season since 2009-10 and are looking for their first division title since that season.
Kevyn Adams’ tenure
Adams, the general manager since 2020-21, brought in some of the players on this team, such as Alex Tuch, Josh Norris, Jason Zucker, Bowen Byram, Ryan McLeod and Josh Doan. He also traded away Jack Eichel (after a dispute over what type of neck surgery he should have), Sam Reinhart, Dylan Cozens and J.J. Peterka. Eichel and Reinhart won Stanley Cup titles after their trades.
Adams drew some criticism last season when he explained the difficulty of drawing free agents to Buffalo and why players often include the city on their no-trade lists.
“We don’t have palm trees,” he told reporters. “We have taxes in New York.”
Adams last season brought back coach Lindy Ruff, who had been coach of the 2010-11 playoff team. But the Sabres continued their pattern of early-season swoons — 0-10-3 this time — and finished 12 points out of a playoff spot.
Buffalo traded No. 2 scorer Peterka to Utah in the offseason and opened the season 0-3. Fans began chanting for Adams’ firing and it finally happened in December.
Jarmo Kekalainen’s tenure
Teams often get a bump from a coaching change, but a front office change can also have an impact because a general manager can decide a player’s future.
Kekalainen noted that his focus was going to be on work ethic, saying the team had lost some games by being outworked.
“You’ve got to work, you’ve got to compete and you’ve got to be relentless,” he said after being named general manager. “That’s what I want the identity of the Buffalo Sabres to be.”
He added that he “firmly” believed that Sabres could be a playoff team.
Kekalainen had been hired as a senior adviser in May. He had been aggressive in Columbus, hanging on to pending free agents Sergei Bobrovsky and Artemi Panarin and adding to a team that shockingly swept the No. 1 overall Tampa Bay Lightning in the first round in 2019.
After he was promoted in Buffalo, he revamped the front office and held on to Ruff. He gave a contract extension to Doan, who was acquired in the Peterka trade. But with the team surging, there was little need to change the players.
The general manager made moves at the deadline to beef up the team’s depth. He traded for Colton Parayko, but it fell through when the defenseman declined to waive his no-trade clause. He pivoted to add big, rugged defensemen Logan Stanley and Luke Schenn. He also added Sam Carrick, who’s strong on faceoffs, and depth forward Tanner Pearson.
A sign that the Sabres were for real was when they defeated the Lightning 8-7 in a game that featured tons of goals and penalty minutes.
What’s next for the Sabres?
They will try to win the Atlantic Division title and still have a chance to be the top seed in the Eastern Conference.
There isn’t a lot of playoff experience in this core because of the long drought. However, Schenn and Pearson are former Stanley Cup winners and McLeod has been to the Final. Tuch has played 66 postseason games and Zucker has played 52.
And Ruff has coached 101 playoff games, winning 57. He took the Sabres to the 1999 Final.
Who has the longest playoff drought?
The Detroit Red Wings are at nine seasons, the Anaheim Ducks are at seven and the San Jose Sharks are at six. But heading into Saturday’s game, the Ducks are second in the Pacific Division, the Sharks hold the second wild-card spot in the West and the Red Wings sit one spot below the playoff line in the East.
The Chicago Blackhawks have been eliminated, and their playoff drought is at six seasons.