Rasmus Ristolainen returns to Buffalo as Flyers are desperate for a win
After the off-season trade to the Flyers, Rasmus Ristolainen will play against the Buffalo Sabres for the first time in his career. And as he mentioned before the game, what better team to come to in order to break a 10-game losing streak.
Despite playing fairly well to start the season, the Sabres are just about where they were expected to be once again. While having a 2-0 and 3-1 lead in their last game, they ended up losing 5-4 to the Stars. Dallas scored four power play goals in the victory, going a crisp 4/5 on the man advantage overall. Buffalo was heavily outshot, 47-24, as they failed to get double digit shots in the final two periods.
The Flyers, as noted above, haven’t been able to get in the win column at all to start off 2022. They’ve gone 0-7-3 in their last 10 which is technically considered a winless streak since they’ve gained points in three of those games. Nonetheless, Philadelphia is absolutely desperate to get back into the win column. At the midpoint of the season, they find themselves needing to dig out of a large hole.
Philadelphia Flyers
Record: 13-19-8 (34 points, 7th in Metro)
News got even worse for Philadelphia recently as Joel Farabee landed on injured reserve on Friday with what’s classified as an upper-body injury. He took a hit from Noah Dobson on Tuesday and may have tweaked something on Thursday as well. So he’ll be sidelined for approximately four weeks.
With that came the opportunity for Wade Allison to return to the NHL level. He had been playing well in his most recent four games for the Phantoms, scoring a goal in each of the last three. That came after another injury sidelined him for about a month. Obviously the team had hoped to give him a bit more time, but the injury to Farabee forced their hand.
He’ll look to spark some energy into a team that almost seemed lifeless against Columbus. In 14 career games, Allison had four goals and seven points. So he should be ready to go for this one.
The most important thing for Philadelphia will be getting off to a strong start. Buffalo has a habit of giving up a lot of goals at times, something the Flyers absolutely need to take advantage of. The Sabres are often outshot in games as well, averaging about 35 shots against per game.
Projected Lineup
Lindblom – Giroux – Atkinson
Allison – Laughton – Konecny
van Riemsdyk – Frost – Mayhew
Willman – Cates – MacEwen
Provorov – Braun
York – Sanheim
Yandle – Ristolainen
Jones
Buffalo Sabres
Record: 12-21-7 (31 points, 6th in Atlantic)
Similar to the Flyers, Buffalo finds themselves towards the bottom of the standings in their division. And there are a large amount of points that separate them from the teams above them.
The beginning of the season went fairly well for the Sabres as they won the first three games of the season and went 5-2-1 to begin the first month. November wasn’t kind to them as they dropped 10 of their 14 games, picking up at least a point in five of those games. Since December 14th, Buffalo has won four of their last 13 games. They’ve registered at least a point in six of those games, two of those in overtime losses aside from the four victories.
So the grass is most definitely not greener on the other side. Buffalo is just as much of a desperate team as Philadelphia. They do have a few players who can put the puck in the net as three Sabres have registered double-digit goals. Jeff Skinner leads the way with 14 goals as he is having a much better season than last. He’s double his goal output and has almost done the same with his point totals thus far.
Tage Thompson is having a strong season as well as he’s second on the team in goals (12) and second in points (25). Rasmus Dahlin leads all skaters with 26 points. Alex Tuch, who came to Buffalo in the Jack Eichel trade, has five points in his last five games. He has three goals and eight points overall in eight games.
Projected Lineup
Skinner – Thompson – Tuch
Krebs – Cozens – Olofsson
Murray – Jankowski – Asplund
Bjork – Eakin – Hayden
Dahlin – Jokiharju
Samuelsson – Pysyk
Bryson – Hagg
Houser
When, Where, and How to Watch
Time: 1:00 p.m.
Where: KeyBank Center
TV Broadcast: NBCSP, NHLN
Radio Broadcast: 97.5 the Fanatic
Live Stream: Fubo TV
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